

### FU

John W. Regan

Copyright © 2016 John W. Regan

All rights reserved.

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Table of Contents

Prologue

1. American Desert 1947

2. Operation Mogul

3. Die Glocke

4. The Roswell Incident

5. Foster's Ranch

6. The Two Sites

7. Press Release

8. The Hanger

9. Sickness

10. Ishii

11. Quarantine

12. Ramey's Actions

13. Recovery

14. Furthermore

15. Tumbleweeds

16. Lincoln LaPaz

17. Road Trip

18. Ft. Detrick

19. Greenville, 1953

20. Sam's Box

Epilogue

# Prologue

Second Lieutenant Takeuchi Haikro hadn't slept last night.

Now...tired...tired but eager...and anxious...

Nervous energy expelled in a shudder. Perspiration pebbled forehead and collected in Haikro's crotch. It felt like he had tinkled in his jumpsuit.

" _Virtuous trip!"_

Head rigid, Haikro's eyes darted left.

Staid in collaged dress uniforms -jade tunics, tan trousers and crumpled russet sen-bou's ringed in perspiration- two officers inspected the crooked muster line of thirty. Major General Sueki Kusaba treated each warrior to the same review: the click of boot heels, a salute with the tasseled shin guntō, and then the hassled command hissed in his reptilian Amami dialect:

" _Virtuous trip!"_

Slinking a step behind Kusaba: tiny Lieutenant-General Shirō Ishii, Surgeon General of the First Japanese Army. Gloved hands laced behind back, white surgical mask covering his face, Ishii eyes (more slanted than usual) studied the bedraggled ratings.

Haikro's older brother, Miasmo, interned under the Lieutenant-General in Harbin. Last December, days before shipping to Luzon, Miasmo confided the nature of his drudgery. And next came the request. Miasmo, who would be dead in two months, hugged his brother and gushed, _'Think of the honor, Haikro! Exaltation beyond the trifling bodycrashing of the special attack units!_ ' Haikro had already committed to the _Tokubetsu Kōgekitai_ ; the honor of sacrifice and a yearning to save Mother and Sisters from Imperialist extinction compelled his soul. But what Miasmo's implored, the opportunity to lash vengeance _on_ American soil...how could Haikro say no?

" _Virtuous trip!"_

Haikro sneezed.

Training for Operation Butterfly necessitated a rigorous, sadistic regimen: corporal punishment, abridged sleep, reduced diet, and protracted sessions in the high-altitude chamber. Five months of education for what amounted to a mission requiring more luck than skill. In theory, the science sounded plausible...but logical hocus pocus didn't factor the human element. No problem, Haikro did the math. He did the math at breakfast. He did the math during exercises. He did the math every evening before shutting eyes. He did the math while he slept and dreamt of countless premature deaths at the hands of his idiotic crew.

Katsumi, the reedy navigator, struggled with simple problems in the altitude chamber. Could he handle calculus in the confines of the vehicle? Would the maps prove useless in his hands? Haikro did the math and calculated an answer. But, if nothing else, busywork kept body and mind occupied...

Tomo, the designated "Epidemic Control Specialist", yapped nonstop about inconsequential matters. He'd have no task to occupy his dull brain during the voyage...no task but keeping quiet. Alas, Tomo struggled with this simple directive.

During drill, there were moments Haikro became so frustrated, he beat his subordinates. The instructors encouraged ruthless management. Haikro realized he'd kill his crewmates given the opportunity. Not like it mattered, of course. They were destined for death.

" _Virtuous..._

***

Last night, Haikro couldn't sleep. While the moon sprinkled gray light through the barracks laths, he did a little math, tossed on the rack, listened to crickets...

He whispered the death poem of Motoori Norinaga and then attempted poesy of his own, a pedestrian Katauta:

There will always be sunlight,

shining on the islands,

I will reside in the glow like

Spring drupe...eh...sagging from...the...a...tree...

...and then balled fists and sighed.

_What of a hanging word?_ Haikro's mind nattered. _Better yet, why won't you sleep, fool? Why are you still awake? Why...why...why?_

Bah! To stress while his comrades snored and wheezed...

Eyes wide, he recited text from the Tokubetsu Kōgekitai manual:

" _Transcend; eliminate all thoughts about your life and your death. Only then will you disregard wanton desires and empower attention on the enemy."_

Over and over, like a prayer...

And he felt better.

An hour before sunrise, a reverential enlistee entered the quarters and roused the men.

Haikro rolled out of bed; he stretched arms, shook legs...and felt a chill.

Then he sneezed.

Matter of fact, as he and colleagues donned Senninbari and gray jumpsuits, there'd been copious sneezing and snot sucking...and a dearth of the usual braggadocios chatter...

***

"... _trip!"_

Haikro coughed.

Tomo croaked, "You sick?"

"Hush," Haikro mumbled.

"I'm not feeling well."

"Shh."

"What if we're sick?"

Haikro gave Tomo the side-eye and then said, "Nobody is sick. We're inoculated. You're anxious."

"What if-"

Haikro elbowed the fool in the ribs and whispered, "Quiet."

What if?

Maybe not _if._

" _Virtuous trip!"_

Miasmo shared a fascinating, but morbid, narrative: in Harbin, Doctor Ishii commanded a research center specializing in the study of biologicals and their effects on the human body. Prisoners were infected, scrutinized, and dissected while alive (' _Known as a vivisection,_ Miasmo informed with clinical indifference, _the operation is mesmerizing and informative.'_ ). Sundry projects, conducted with chemicals and incendiary devices, yielded refined surgical procedures. Not once did Miasmo express uneasiness. Indeed, he beamed and chattered about the beneficial _scientific_ gains reaped for the Co-Prosperity Sphere.

And the prisoners? _'They volunteered for the honor of improving mankind,'_ Miasmo said. _'Logs are felled to build a house. So many logs, Haikro._ _The logic applies to the construction of an Empire.'_

" _Virtuous trip!"_

Everyone played a vital role in the war effort. Those who commanded, those who fought, those who became logs... _destiny_ -the red string pulled taut- is delivered, not sought.

Haikro's fate wasn't different than a leaf carried by the wind. Perhaps a trite explanation, but soothing. And apropos...

A short distance from the assembled, tethered to bulbous stakes by thick hemp rope, ten balloons strained for the sky. Inflated -and encased in a sturdy frame of dowels, cables and bamboo rigging- these chestnut bulbs of washi, parchment and reflective foil spanned ten meters in diameter. Stirred by a light breeze, the balloons jingled like jewelry around a shaken wrist.

Hanging fifteen meters beneath each distend bladder, secured to the rattling frame by tapered poles and ballast hawsers, square metal capsules awaited their suicidal cargo. Cab dimensions equaled two meters in every aspect: width, length, height. Appointment to Operation Butterfly required volunteers meet stringent physical requirements: no greater than 55 kilograms in weight, no more than 162 centimeters tall, and a maximum shoulder-to-shoulder width of 40 centimeters. Haikro's mass tickled 53 kilograms on the scale when he reported to the Honshu camp in January. Limited to a 600 calorie-a-day diet, his weight dropped to 47 kilograms by the end of April. But everyone shed stones...the lot of them looked emaciated. And there'd be no food in transit. The capsule lacked adequate facilities to dispense solid waste. Even urination in the pee-canteen, if required, appeared an almost impossible task.

" _Virtuous trip!"_

The pelt lined coat and jumpsuit, gloves and headgear added a layer of bulk confining movement. One afternoon, Haikro asked his instructor why the cumbersome suit had to be worn. Captain Sora growled, slapped Haikro with his bamboo baton, and then snarled, _'Fool! You'll freeze at altitude without it!'_ To accentuate the point, Sora demanded Haikro sit in the hyperbaric chamber wearing an undershirt and skivvies. At 5500 meters, the temperature registered a frigid -30 degrees Celsius. The point had been made and, further, Haikro decided he wouldn't bother to unsheathe his chinchin should the urge arise. He'd hollow the bladder in his suit.

Crammed into the cockpit, the crew of three had little room to move. As the pilot, Haikro rested rear in the best seat, the middle chair (a generous label given the chair consisted of two pieces of teak fastened at a seventy-degree angle), allowing unfettered peeps through the small windscreen. Tomo, shoved in the cantered left throne, lacked a direct line of sight. Lest Tomo complain, he could stretch legs and arms. Katsumi, laden with maps and charts in the right seat, had a diminutive view of the heavens. A sextant and telescope mounted in the top of the bulkhead contained his window to the world. He'd direct Haikro where to steer...in theory.

" _Virtuous trip!"_

The vehicle exhibited an ode to humble ingenuity: tapered rudder connected by cordage cables to foot pedals in the cockpit; three-blade propeller secured to the underside of the craft; fuel cell containing twenty-five kilograms of kerosene (Haikro did the math: one hour of fuel for an almost three-day trip); vertical motion, measured by an aneroid, discarded ballast when the balloon descended below 16 inches of atmospheric pressure. Furthermore, at 13 inches, the aneroid vented hydrogen. Calibrated to a critical level (6 inches), the control system dumped all hydrogen. The pilot was also afforded a manual dump "lever" by which hydrogen could be exhausted. Three 45 kg Mitsubishi "C" cylinder tanks, located behind the pilot seat, each provided 16 hours of supplemental oxygen at a flow rate of .75 liters-per-minute. Ishii informed, based on empirical data, the time of _useful_ consciousness at 5500 meters for healthy young men amounted to a half-hour:

' _Yes, you'll be sleepy and lethargic,_ the Doctor told the crews, _'but occasional, and conservative hits of O2 will reinvigorate and reset the clock. In moments when the balloon exceeds 5500 meters, and before the aneroid system corrects altitude, oxygen masks must be donned. But exercise self-control. You must have at least one hour of supplemental remaining when you cross the Imperialists West Coast. This will allow for a rapid ascent above visual detection and enemy airplanes.'_

At the mercy of the Westerlies, ensnared in the jet stream, the meteorological charts forecasted a swift 68 hours to cross the Pacific and reach mainland United States. Drifting too far south introduced the balloon to the Subtropical Easterlies and certain failure. Captain Sora stressed success or disaster depended on remaining above the 30N line of longitude. Haikro did the math and determined the rudder and powerplant wouldn't produce enough force to counter the wild river of wind. He considered questioning Captain Sora but, upon doing the math, decided to keep his mouth sealed.

" _Virtuous trip!"_

If the balloon reached the United States, Haikro would vent hydrogen, aim for a location, trust the parachute deployment mechanism worked as promised and brace for landing. Then, after popping the hatch and squeezing from the capsule, the three warriors would run, or stagger, or...perhaps legs wouldn't work at first...they'd crawl, or summersault to a water source, population center, any target would do, and release the agent stockpiled under Tomo's seat.

Nobody knew the name of the biological. Even Tomo, the so-called "Specialist", didn't know. Tomo trained to disperse the poison. Opening phials, releasing spores, whatever the procedure, couldn't be complicated. Yet, what if Tomo died during the trip? What if Haikro found himself alone on the Imperialists soil. What if they all perished? What then?

" _Virtuous trip!"_

Though they'd been given shots (' _An antidote to the pestilence,'_ Ishii assured), Haikro doubted such a thing existed. The orderly administering the prescription assured, _'Lieutenant, Unit 731 developed a treatment in Harbin.'_

But, once again, Haikro did the math: he and his comrades carried the kernel of wanton invocation.

" _Virtuous trip!"_

Haikro peeked left, past Tomo and Katsumi...and felt the Type 14 Nambu rub against his right flank. The pistol housed an eight-round magazine. Whether enemy or despair compelled use remained to be seen. Haikro hoped the former but allocated-

" _Virtuous trip"_

-one bullet for himself if capture loomed. Or maybe if it didn't.

" _Virtuous trip!"_

Kusaba moved faster. The forced formality of the ceremony disappointed Haikro. He understood the reasoning, but skipping the ceremonial sake and reading of death poems-

" _Virtuous trip!"_

-turned this into a graduation without pomp. Ishii fingered his mask, smoothed it over the bridge of his nose. Katsumi straightened legs, then hacked, as Kusaba approached.

Imperialist war criminals, gaunt PW's from Camp 3 forced to inflate the balloons with hydrogen from tanks in the Isuzu 6x6's, stood in a sloppy muster line of their own. The prisoners were given this task as ironic punishment-

" _Virtuous trip!"_

-and Ishii addressed the captives before the work began. Haikro didn't understand English but saw their round eyes widen in astonishment. Several refused with defiant sneers and were put to the sword by soldiers unskilled in the art of beheading...or the stony IJA sentries pretended as much. The hacking of-

" _Virtuous trip!"_

-dull sword on bone made a sound like a spoon slicing bamboo. Imperialist screams added tang to the misery. After three examples of messy execution, the remainder of the disgraced airmen fell in line. The corpses, and their lopped heads, left where they-

Kusaba materialized in front of Haikro, blocking the morbid view. The General scowled, pursed lips and then snarled, "Lieutenant!"

Woozy, Haikro squared shoulders and jutted chin.

"Virtuous trip!" Kusaba woofed with a salute of his sword.

Haikro bowed at the waist, sneezed, and returned to attention.

Kusaba turned on his heel and marched to the front of the assembled thirty. He elevated his sword and cleared throat. Someone coughed; several sneezed. The General waited for quiet and then said:

"Warriors, go strong with a heart beating retribution. On the wings of the divine wind you will soar, martyrs for the Emperor and the Empire. Know your success will bring honor and your sacrifice everlasting life. In this year, Kōki 2605, our Empire will triumph against the Devils and the Dirt! Tennōheika Banzai!"

Thirty arms raised and thirty voices responded in a phlegmy, "Tennōheika Banzai!"

***

Like dandelion florets the balloons floated, framed in the blush of the ascending sun. The pilots ignited propellers and coxed their crafts, aligning their planned heading to the magnetic compass mounted on the glareshield. Gliding over the ocean, dwindling with distance, the convoy shrunk to faint brown specks minutes after departure.

While the Nip guards chanted Oriental mumbo-jumbo, the prisoners-of-war watched in silence as the enemy sallied into red ether. During the inflation, some of the men tried to puncture the skin of the balloons with their ragged fingernails. Thick, impenetrable paper made sabotage pointless. An Army captain from Mt. Lebanon, Pennsylvania, named Dale Palmer found a tapered stone and, when the guards weren't looking, etched his initials and the year _1945_ onto the balloon in big, messy letters. Then, for good measure, he added his entire appellation. He hoped the message...rather, _most_ of him hoped...but a small portion...no, it'd be better if nobody found the missive, even if it meant Dale Palmer's end remained a mystery.

Palmer had no illusions about his fate but doubted these balloons would alter the outcome of the war. The Nip bigwig with the mask called it a _vengeance attack_. Oh, them Butterheads. Them Butterheads stammering about vengeance tickled the stuffing out of Dale Palmer. _Vengeance?_ The dumbshit Butterheads started the war! Dale stifled a laugh because...because this brainchild of a mission amounted to a panicky wheeze from the dying Empire. The Japanese were misled by veracity and Captain Palmer relished watching them wither, even from the inside-out. Their stubbornness made them stupid, stupid people. And not even people. Animals, the whole yella lot of 'em.

For months, the prisoners assembled the balloons in a giant hanger on the grounds of Camp 3. Some tried to guess the nature of the work. Most didn't care. While not difficult, hours spent gluing the paper squares together with konnyaku...sunrise until after dark...numbed the fingers. The glue smelled like flowers and tasted sweet. Everyone ate the paste, including Dale. And not a man felt an ounce of shame doing so.

Any semblance of shame long passed...

***

At one time, Dale Palmer had been cocky. In June 1943, cockiness got his P-40 filled with lead during a patrol over New Guinea -near Mubo- by a trio of Zeke's (Dale wasn't sure, but he thought they might have been the Nip Model 22 cuz of them drop tanks under each stubby, rounded wing). Suckered into chasing one Zeke, and splitting from his wingman in the process, two others jumped his six and made short work of his tail.

Under powered flight, he crash-landed into thick jungle and scampered from the wreckage with nary a scratch. Cockiness returned, somewhat, tho the situation kinda terrified. He knew the Nips lurked and the jungle wasn't accommodating...but Dale trundled east, towards the Pimple, and prayed he'd find a village of friendlies or Aussie soldiers.

As luck would have it, a squad of six from the Australian 2/7th ( _'G'day, sir. Probers from the Pimple. At yer service, mate,'_ the NCO reported to Dale in his bizarre accent) found him the next morning. Led by two aborigines, the group tried returning to Australian held Mubo under cover of darkness. An advancing Jap patrol caught them within a stone's throw of the Pimple. The Nips appeared like yella demons out of the vegetation and nobody had so much as a chance to piss their britches. If Dale could do it over, he'd have made a go of it. But the Nips moved quick, secured the surprised enemy, and then whisked them to a dilapidated encampment (at double-time pace with arms raised) on the Buisaval Track.

The rumors of Jap depravity weren't a fabrication of propaganda, but hours of captivity passed without fuss. When the Japs realized they had an American pilot, they blindfolded Dale and transported him by truck to another location. Even then...fed, cleaned, permitted to write a pithy letter to the IRC...the Nips were amicable, though they kept him isolated in a small hut. Dale conceived of the tale he'd tell his pals, fiancée and, someday, his kids. _There I was, a prisoner of the Japs..._

At last, the Nips decided to roll sleeves and get to work. An interrogator arrived, a skinny NCO with a fundamental command of English, and badgered Dale (but in a conversational tone) for details: fortifications at Port Moresby, size of the air fleet, number of men and disposition, commanding officers, favorite baseball team, name of "goil you sweet on", hometown...on and on, hours of questions.

To every query, Dale responded: "Dale Palmer, Captain, U.S. Army, my identification number is..."

This back and forth passed until the Jap leaned over the table and ripped Dale's dog tags from his neck. Then he shoved them into a trouser pocket and said, "You need-a undestand twee _impotant_ tings, Cap-it-an. A one: a one day, you will not-a weememba this-a G.I. numba. A tow: the Empie-a of Japan did-a not watify Geneva Convention. With-a weespect to Pisnoses of-a Woah, an attempt is-a made to tweat in acowdints with-a the povisions of enlisted in the Kwantung Ahme. Few-a Impeelits have found this-a wigowous discipline comfotable. A twee: if you weefuse to collabowate, you will-a live the weemainder of time in-a detention. You will-a die in-a detention, Cap-it-an. But I give you chance to a-"

"Save your breath," Dale interrupted. "I ain't talking to you."

The Jap stood, crossed arms and departed with a scowl plastered to his squashed face.

The Nip tried the next day...and the following day...he might've pestered for a week...time ran together after a while...but long story short: Dale said nothing. And the Japs? Their treatment became less cordial. From New Guinea he sailed to Rabaul, loitered for a spell in a solitary cell, feed almost nothing, talked to nobody. Then he travelled to the Phillipeans. Dale spent months in Old Bilibid with thousands of other PW's before being loaded on a transport to Japan. He'd been warned about the "hell ships" and the rumors didn't disappoint. Crammed in a dark, scorching cargo hold with 200 odd men, the semblance of military order and hierarchy disintegrated. The constant threat of attack by Allied subs and airplanes made the trip seem longer than the two weeks it took to zigzag north. The Nips offered scraps of food and almost no water; men fought each other for the paltry fare. An Army colonel missing an eye -one of MacArthur's abandoned- tried to restore order, but nobody listened to him, Dale included. Instead, Dale joined forces with a dozen West Pointers and they scratched a territory in the pen. Foreigners, Squids, Jarheads, the enlisted, and officers over 40 were prohibited from joining their gang. Rations were secured, often by force. Meanwhile, the sick died and were cast into a corner. Days passed until the corpses were collected. Nobody batted an eyelash. Dale's cockiness disappeared and he reverted to an unrefined state of existence. The survival at any cost mentality turned civilized men into monsters...and the Nips relished the transformation. But self-awareness didn't curb behavior. Yes, awful things transpired on the hell ship...

In Japan, Dale passed through a series of sub-camps before arriving on Honshu, dispensed to Camp Number 3, in November 1944. Once again, an interrogator (this one with a better command of English) offered something akin to a "better life" in exchange for a broadcast to American sailors, soldiers and the citizens at home.

"You say," the interrogator explained through a smile, "the war effort is a waste of time and a grave mistake. You talk and then you obtain better accommodations. You talk and then you contact family. You talk and you will be fed. A square deal, a fair deal, for a few sentences."

Dale crossed arms and countered, "Dale Palmer, Captain, U.S. Army, serial number...my identification number...is...my number...um..." Lo and behold, the number, _his_ number...gone. Purged from memory.

The interrogator scoffed, "Have it your way. Don't say you're weren't offered a choice. You have yourself to blame for-

***

-everything," Dale finished in a whisper. Then he pivoted, put the sea at his back, placed hands on narrow hips, and watched the IJA sentries unsling their Type 99 bolt action rifles.

He wasn't cocky anymore.

Hard to believe...two years ago...less than two...he strapped into a cockpit and took the fight to the enemy. Way back when, Dale Palmer believed, to a fault, he was invincible. More than once, he spun Sedgwick's spurs and avoided the old man's ghost; he walked the area more than any cadet in his class and joined the infamous Century Club; he weathered the storm of Army-Navy football games.

But he had no fantasies about surviving the war. The voyage on the hell ship showed him no one was special. Not colonels or privates. Not Aussies nor Americans. The war would kill everyone.

His biggest fear wasn't death; faith assured a Kingdom awaited his soul. However, the anonymity of death triggered profound discontent. He'd be erased from this realm like the rest, discarded and forgotten. Nobody -not his parents, fiancée and friends- would know what became of him. He would _vanish_ , like the balloons. Time would swallow Dale Palmer until his name meant nothing to the people he loved, and the people who loved him.

_Here I am_ , he thought, _and I'm never going home._

Not ever.

Ben Whitcomb, standing to Dale's right, bemoaned, "I can't believe I just helped them bastards."

"Those swells aren't gonna make a difference," Louis McClain said. "Ain't nothing but bullshit, fellas."

"Nobody's ever going to know," Dale said, falling to his rump.

"Stand up, Palmer," Whitcomb hissed. "You wanna get your head sawed off?"

Dale Palmer ignored the absurd question; he flopped onto his back, closed eyes, and stole a few seconds of tranquility before kicking off.

As distance erased the last balloon, gunfire erupted on the bluffs of Hamamatsu. Later, the bodies were burned in a large pyre by dingy, slant-eyed men wearing masks; the choking smoke, dispersed by a merciful sea breeze, drifted north towards Mt. Daimugen.

# 1. American Desert 1947

Holding court at the local watering hole, Major Sam Pix -dressed in a wrinkled khaki Class C uniform (minus tie and decorations...which he should've sported but nobody in Project Mogul gave a rat's ass and even if they did, our pal Sammy woulda told them to kiss his posterior), seventy-two inches tall, thirty-two years young, willow thin, in dire need of a haircut, _and_ a Distinguished Flying Cross recipient (Sammy also had an Air Medal with the Bronze OLCs, meaning he had two Air Medals, but damn near everyone in the Eighth Air Force got at least two Air Medals so whoop dee doo) -paused in the midst of his two engine out, tail shot to shit over Saxony yarn, and cast a sneaky peek to the right. Meanwhile, Sam's audience of five yokels -four middle-aged men and the bartender (Fred O'Reilly, the Weed's administrator of booze, be sorta middle-aged too...but he also be bald as Gandhi, stooped like a cripple, smoked them Gawd-awful Camel's by the crate and caught, _at best_ , a couple thousand doses from the atom bomb tests down the road. The sum of this equation: Sam reckoned Fred passed "middle age" about a decade ago) leaned forward with worry wrinkles indented in their brows.

Yep, the story be getting exciting, and Sam wagged quite the silver tongue since arriving in New Mexico, but he didn't care an iota about his spectators. The attention he coveted...well, sir, she _insisted_ on playing stoopid games: Julie Brazel -but she preferred _Jules_ (and she also preferred what the Brits called the _Aussie kiss..._ which happened to be something Sam _hated_ to perform, by the way, yet he did it with a _minimal_ amount of carping)- smacked gum and yakked with a greasy Mexican ranch hand in a booth across the room. Jules _sorta_ had no choice but to engage the vaquero...she was, after all, the only server in the dump...

But still.

And it wasn't like Jules pretended her old pal Sammy didn't exist. A glance over her shoulder at him, blond ponytail waving, and the quick riffle of her squinty eyes suggested promise. Or...maybe the imaginator be imaginating (and, yeah, Sam knew them two derivatives of _imagination_ weren't words, but he didn't care). The atmosphere in the Tumbleweed resembled the inside of a chimney. And he was, oh...about a half beer away from reaching four sheets. In other words: between cigarette smoke and booze, Major Pix's visual acuity be _somewhat_ crooked.

Drunk or otherwise, tho, Sam couldn't deny the obvious: she'd been avoiding him for a week, perhaps two...at this point, his crummy days all ran together. Squashing tedium by swapping war stories and getting tight got to be a mite repetitive. At some point, he'd tire of echoing the same ole...which left getting humdinged as the lone time waster. And getting humdinged, while fine and dandy, happened to be an uncarnel (if such a word existed...and it didn't...and Sam knew it...and he didn't care, thank you very much) and unsatisfying method to piss away whatever time he had left on the rotten Earf.

Sam pulled peepers from Jules, ran a hand through the tangled mop on his head, and then frowned. Passion didn't have to be complicated and women weren't convoluted. Females enjoyed the rumpy dumpy just as much as their ball bearing counterparts, and this wasn't Sam justifying _anything_.

It be fact.

Heck, even Ma...Ma who believed the Bible b and s without question...stepped out on poor Walt Pix. Altho the old lady would never admit to being a Jezebel, Sam didn't care anyway because the old man stopped paying attention to her long before-

"Hey, Sammy," Johnny Hurley said. "Cat got your tongue, pardner?"

-Dad got smote or smited or whatever the term be. Jules wanted to ignore him and run to _what's his name_? Well...fine. Sam wasn't going to twist her arm. Besides, if Jules didn't want a piece of Sam, he'd find somebody else in this shithole town. Hell, his reputation sold itself: war hero; hotshot pilot; project technician for Operation Mogul and...okay, this last title didn't get the lingerie on the floor like the others but Sam...he could wow the virginity from Mother Mary with stories about balloons, propagation and triangulation. What girl wouldn't get turned on by high altitude experiments?

Christ, who was he kidding?

Sam groaned, rubbed the bridge of his nose, and then said, "A'ight... _ahem_...so, there we were, them two starboard engines-"

"Starboard?" Hurley asked with a confused look.

"Right side, shit for brains!" Leslie Wright exclaimed.

"Jeez, Les, take it easy," Hurley said. "I wasn't in the God-blessed navy."

"Neither was the cap'n. Starboard right, port left. How many times I gotta explain it to ya?"

Sammy raised his hands and silenced the quarrelling. Idiotic arguments were a frequent occurrence among the pickled bunch, and idiotic arguments sometimes drove nails into our hero's skull. In these moments, our pal braced hisself with the ole, _making lemons out of lemonade_ , mindset. Were the denizens of the Weed a little stoopid? Sure...but everyone in Roswell be a _whole_ lot smarter than the male hicks he rubbed elbows with in Greenville. This isn't to say Sam couldn't tolerate the standard issue gun toting, dust covered, rough handed, sunburnt, Roy Acuff and Jack Anglin listenin', chew spittin' Mississippi Delta white trash.

However, in most cases the SI regalia also contained a dash of sumptin else...and the sumptin else be Klan nonsense. Sam Pix despised Kluckers just a smidge more than he despised Nazis. And he despised Nazis just a smidge more than he despised the Aussie kiss. And...welp, Sam could spend hours listing all the things he despised, but the Klan be tops. Bottom line: not one of the fellas in the Tumbleweed were Kluckers. They just weren't firing on all four.

Of course, there were _theoretical_ exceptions to the rule. Gus Cramer (Les once shared) attended the USNA and served in the Marines...1st Lieutenant, if memory served...meaning Gus had gone to college and received an education. _Theoretical_ be the adjective Sam ascribed to Gus Cramer's edification cuz the ole Jarhead offered jack in the way of bawdry conversation and squat in terms of refined sentiment. All pensive-like, Gus treated his mug like an alchemist's cauldron. He'd stare into the hops, stare deep, with eyes smushed between a crumpled brow. No doubt Gus saw some nasty shit in the Pacific... _no doubt_ cuz his left arm be a nubbin.

But still...

"So, fellers, both _right_ engines out," Sam continued after a sip of beer. "My copilot...oh, and you should know, he's one of them...eh...whatcha call a conventional kike from the Big Apple, see? Not a bad stick...but..." Sam cleared his throat and channeled "Brooklyn" Benny Green in all his Jewy, worrywart splendor: _"Oh, jeez! We gotz to makes it back to Nuthampstead! We can't bail over Germany, Sammy! These Jerries hate da Jewz!"_

The men laughed...all of 'em except Gus. He glowered, the wet noodle, and swirled beer.

Our hero crossed his arms and then said, "I told Benny, _too fuckin' bad._ It's how the cookie crumbles. I wasn't gonna ride ole _Zoë Zinger_ into the ground, much as I loved the girl."

"And you swear it wasn't flak?" Leslie asked.

"Huh?"

"You were saying, cap'n, them injins and the tail and yer bird...shot up, but naught be the Jerry flak, right?"

"I know it," Sam said, lowering his voice. "But, um...I ain't so privileged to say and you ain't so privileged to hear. Whatcha call a Tough Shit edict, Les."

"Tough Shit edict?"

"Top Secret," Sam whispered.

"Sure, cap'n," Les teased. "Tough shit, huh? Betcha this is some kinda code for a pilot boo-boo, _he-he_."

Sam shrugged, and supped, and then shrugged again. His story had reached the notional end...but there be _much_ more to the episode. Flying disks, perturbed brass, a churlish goon from the OSS...and vows of silence from Sam (and Benny and the ball turret gunner from Cairo, New York)...this be the rest of the story. The rest, though, would die on Sam's hairy tongue; he promised not to blab, never ever to infinity times a googol, cross his heart, hope to die, etcetera, ad infinitum, in the eye.

Someday, Sammy acknowledged with a smidge of compunction, he'd spill the beans after having one too many. Maybe he'd aim to tattle; maybe not. Maybe Sam Pix be a Class A fuck-up no matter the circumstance. He could blame the old man, and slash or predestination, and slash or his pecker, for what impetuousness wrought, but Uncle Sammy didn't care. When Sam Pix blew his shrill whistle, the big bad wolf would come huffin' and puffin'. Fact be, the motherfucker was licking chops, waiting for the summons.

But today wouldn't be the day.

"Some Nazi death ray," cackled Les. "Eh, Sammy?"

"Not a death ray, fella. I wish I could tell ya but-"

"He's right," Gus declared.

"Wha?" Sam asked.

Gus swirled his mug, watched the bubbles rise to the surface, and then said, "Your copilot. The Yid. He's right. The Krauts hated Jews."

"Yeah, yeah, we all knew the score," our pal said. "What's funny...I mean, I _guess_ it ain't funny, but you had to be there. The look on Benny's face, when he thought we were gonna bail-"

"I don't think it's funny," Gus interrupted. "Goddamn Krauts killed millions of 'em."

"Matter of-"

"Shut your fool mouth, Pix," Gus growled.

Sam raised his hands, smiled and then said, "Whoa, Gus. I got you five by five, pal. But, um...I'm fixin' to explain whatcha call the irony of war. Sammy, our dear old Uncle Sammy, mailed a few Yids first class to Jesus on more than-"

"The fuck you blabbering about?" Gus interrupted, _again_...which, if Sam's math be correct, tallied three interruptions. Three interruptions, by the way, totaled the number of interruptions Sam considered a smidge impolite, even in a dump like the Tumbleweed.

"See, I'm _tryin'_ to cram some knowledge into your thick Jarhead. During Big Week, we bombed the bejeezus out of what High Command claimed be an airframe manufacturing center outside Braunschweig. Turned out it was one of them Nazi labor camps. Go figure. So..." Sam shrugged and put the stein to his lips.

"Was this a Tough Shit edict?" Les asked in a hushed voice.

Sam swallowed and then said, "No, chief. _That's_ what you call a major fuck-up."

Gus rotated on his stool, snorted like a bull, and compressed lips. He looked ready to tangle...or...sumptin. Sam wasn't sure what got the cripple's goat, but he'd have no problem smacking the one-armed fella around...just as soon as he polished off his beer.

"Come on, Gus," Leslie said. "Don't snap your cap. Cap'n is just tellin' a story."

Tho he thought about reminding Leslie, yet again, he was a _Major_ not a _Cap'n_ , Sam decided it wasn't worth the effort.

"Peanuts to his story!" Gus rumbled. Then he raised his stump, wiggled it, and barked, "I got a story! You don't see me flapping gums!" He pushed from the bar with his good arm, pitched Sam a stony glare in passing, and ambled for the door.

After Gus disappeared outside, John Hurley whispered: "Holy crow, what's his problem?"

Fred O'Reilly grabbed the abandoned beer and then dumped it into the sink. "I reckons it's his bad time of the month," Fred said. "Short on cash, waiting on our Uncle's check, feeling sorry for hisself, not likes I blames him."

"You guys didn't bail, did you, cap'n?" Les asked, nudging our hero in the ribs.

Rubbing a hole in his forehead, Sam glanced at Jules again and then muttered, "I need a fresh one, Fred."

***

The Weed cleared-out by ten most nights and midnight on the weekends. As usual, Sam was the last patron leaning against the bar that Saturday evening. He switched to whiskey after it got dark and Fred matched him shot-for-shot. The bartender, fifteen years older than Sam, had been born in the sweet spot (the _one_ sweet spot in an otherwise wretched Twentieth Century bent on taking a big mounding poo-poo on humanity with wars, economic depressions, Prohibitions, influenzas, anarchists, assassinations, Shirtwaist Fires, Fatty Arbuckles, and blah, blah, blippity-fucking-blah): too young for one world war and too old for another. Fifteen years older... _perhaps_ wiser than Sam when temperate...but Fred proved a lightweight on the high test: he drained lightning into his gullet and his blood turned from transporting oxygen to pumping fool-thoughts.

"I'll tell you something else," Fred said, slapping the bar with his hand. "You wanna know why Ted Williams is the best ballplayer _ever_?"

"Not again with Ted Williams," Sam groused. Ole Fred thought Teddy walked on water or sumptin. Now, our old pal didn't have a problem with a grown man idolizing a baseball player, but there was only so much Teddy Williams a fella could take before the topic got a mite repetitive.

"He's a patriot _and_ a power hitter," intoned Fred.

Most instances, Sam would've nodded or waved a dismissive hand. However, between Jules and Gus and the big bad wolf _and_ a salty disposition honed to a fine point by booze, indolence, misery...he couldn't help himself. "Listen, Fred," Sam said through a phony grin, "I think it's _wonderful_ Ted did his part. But you know what? Joey D served. Stan the Man served. Injuns, Negros, Mexicans, Eskimos...tarnation, women built tanks and airplanes. Damn near _everyone_ served. Everyone except _you_ , fella."

"Hell's bells, I was a 1-H. Ain't I tells-"

"Yeah, you _tolds_ me. You've also tolds me, for the past seven months, Ted Williams is the greatest baseball player ever. _Ever?_ This is a mite generous."

"Teddy is a _real_ American. DiMaggio? He's a Wop. A wop and a fancy pants."

"A fancy pants?" Sam scoffed.

"DiMaggio cares more about how he looks than how he plays."

"Oh, jeez-"

"And Musial?" Fred squawked with a head of steam. "What kinda name is Musial? German?"

"I don't know, but guess what? I don't care."

"Could be Russian," Fred mused, rubbing his chin. "Only thing worse than a Nazi is a Commie."

There were things worse than either, but Sam downed his shot and pointed at the glass. Then he stared into the mirror behind the bar. _There are snakes in jungles capable of eating a man whole,_ he thought. _Whole! Is this worse than a Commie? Shit, Fred, you ever seen your buddies get blown to smithereens? Or worse, watch a B-17 lose a wing, roll inverted and tumble slow-like from twenty-five thousand feet while you stuffed snuff into your mouth and pretended you didn't watch ten fellas spend their last twenty seconds of life falling inverted and slow-like to Mother Earf? Ever seen what happens to the kid sitting in the bombardier seat when his station takes one in the snotbox? I can tell you, it's worse than a Commie, Fred. I can tell you the kid looks nutin like a kid. There ain't enough of the kid left to scrape into a box. And now the Luden's sponsored 'Strike It Rich' question, ole Freddy boy: ever wonder why a bonafide humdinged knucklehead like your old pal still kicks when smart fellas with wives and children...guys named Johnny Baxter and Royce Lewis and Cecil Dawber and_...

...and this be the point when Sam _shoulda_ pushed the refreshed whiskey aside and stumbled out the Weed.

Stumbled out for good.

If he had a pair, then...

_If, then...what,_ Brain badgered.

The _If Then_ list used to be a smidge longer. In the afterglow of war, something Sam never thought he'd see (the 8th Air Force tallied half the Army Air Force's downers during World War II...sumptin like 46,000 casualties including 25,000 fatalities) came the submarining of a hunky-dory gig in the Pentagon. Even the carrot of flying fangled Nazi prototypes and jet engine jobbers couldn't keep our old pal on the straight and narrow. _If you toe the line,_ _Major,_ General Walsh said, _then you'll join your buddy Dick Bong in Nevada._

General Walsh didn't say _when_ you toe the line...because the General knew better. So did Sam. And Sam also knew: _if_ you rumpy dumpy with the wife of General Pederson...and even tho General Pederson worked in Public Affairs and never set a toe outside D.C. during the war, took fire, received a Distinguished Flying Cross, or did _anything_ of consequence except polish shoes and compose propaganda... _then_ you get what you deserve.

If...then...Roswell.

He wanted to blame Vera Pederson for the banishment. _She_ couldn't keep her hands off him, nor could she keep her mouth shut...which was good in one sense and bad in all the others. When he received orders and the kick on his ass, Sam understood General Pederson meant to dump him in the most godforsaken place in North America. Dump Sam in a hole, chain him to a desk and encourage insanity.

Welp, so be it. But Sam wasn't doing himself any favors...no, sir. Getting humdinged, he reasoned, made Roswell tolerable. Or booze _would_ make Roswell tolerable. The logic was airtight: booze had been his first apt distraction, and booze picked up the slack when other distractions failed to distract. Somewhere along this crooked line, booze and Sam stopped working in simpatico. Now, it seemed, distraction gave way to painful introspection. He didn't want to think about nutin. He didn't want to think about commies, dead buddies, Walt Pix, _Die Glocke_ , Ted Williams, Vera Pederson, Roswell...

If you don't wanna thunk, then you get drunk. So get drunking and quit thunking!

He took the shot into his left hand and studied his distorted reflection in the streaky mirror.

_Here I am_ , thought Sam. _I'm at a dead fucking end._

There were days his entire body ached, skin burned, each sound pricked the ole brain, and Sam wanted to crawl into a dark corner and die. Being dead...a bad road to explore but...what he was doing? Each day he worked to deaden his mind and each day his mind got gloomier. Ma Pix would tell him to seek the Lord's guidance, but Sam knew the Lord had bigger problems than another down-and-out drunk.

He lifted the glass to his mouth as Fred prattled in a slurry monotone, "...and I'll tells you another reason why..."

Julie emerged from the swinging doors leading to the kitchen and hung her apron on a hook. Sam drained the booze and attempted to appear diffident, which wasn't hard given his state of intoxication. Maybe it was the funhouse-like image in the glass, but without her apron on...Jules looked a _tad_ bouncy in the midsection...

He cocked head as Jules reported, "Fred, I don't know if I'll be in tomorrow."

Fred halted the one-sided conversation with Sam long enough to rasp, "Huh?"

"Mac has a cold. I just talked to him on the phone. He's feeling rotten."

"Oh...well, you better let me know sooner rather than later, hon. If I gotta gets the missus to cover your shift, I needs advanced warning. Alice hates stepping in here, he-he."

She passed behind Sam, head high, a _tad_ bouncy in the midsection...

His brain cheeped: _As of late, you mean. She wasn't quite so bouncy a few weeks ago, fella._

He coughed, pebbling the fake wood with droplets, as the door slammed.

"Tarnation, Sam," Fred squawked, as he grabbed a hand towel. "Something go down the wrong pipe?"

"Along those lines," Sam responded with no hint of irony. "Say, is it me, or does Jules...um, Julie...does she look heavier to you?"

"Heavier? Gee, I don't think so. Why?"

"I just...see...your mirror...I think it's warped or sumptin."

"Yeah, it's a piece of junk. I've been meaning to replace it but..." Fred folded the rag over his shoulder and continued, "...but, anyway, you watch. Teddy will crack 400 again before-"

The door opened with a creak and Sam turned his head slow-like to the left. Julie stood in the frame, looking agitated. And, from this vantage point, she didn't look _plenus_. No...maybe...shit, did it matter? Because she be looking at him the way she used to look at him when...

_Got to be car problems,_ he thought. Rather, he hoped her-

"It's my car," she confirmed. "I need a hand. It won't start."

"Got it, Fred," Sam said as he slid off the stool. He tried not to look too eager but estimated his tongue hung from his mouth like a bird dog.

"Darling, you needs to get it fixed," Fred called. "How many-"

The door closed behind our old pal, sealing the rest of Fred's statement to the world of the Weed, but it didn't matter. Fred O'Reilly uttered the same nonsense about a hundred times before.

***

She leaned on the hood of the red Nash, tapping her foot, looking impatient. When he got within arms-reach, she held up her right palm.

"Car's fine," Jules said.

"No shit."

"I'm serious. Car's fine. I wanna talk."

Sam hung his head and stared at his stompers. A second later, he mumbled, "I don't have time for this. Maybe later, when I ain't so tipsy."

"You don't have time to talk? All you do in there is yap."

"Christ," he said, feeling the ole stomach quiver. "It ain't the time for _that_ business."

"What business?"

"You ain't on the nest, are you?"

"The nest?"

"You know, layin' eggs. I swear, Jules-"

"I'm not...wait, you think I'm pregnant?"

He looked at her, shrugged, and then said, "The thought crossed my mind."

"Why?"

Sam realized, _because you look like you've gained a few_ wasn't the _best_ response. Instead, he babbled, "I...I had a weird feeling...or sumptin."

"No, Sam, I'm _not._ "

"Weeeelll..." he drawled, bubbling with relief, "why don't you follow me to the base. We'll talk there, eh?"

"No. Here."

"Hell's bells," Sam moaned. "What's with you, Jules?"

"I want to talk. What happens at your place doesn't involve talking."

"All right, we'll talk. How about this? Are me and the Mexican sharing crops?"

"Jorge?"

"I don't know his name, but you spent-"

"His name's Jorge and no. _Gawd_ no. You thought...what'd you think?"

"How come you've been avoiding me?"

She crossed her arms and said, "We can't do this anymore, Sam."

"Says who?"

"Says me."

"Why?"

"Because secrets like this have a way of getting out. We've been sneaking around for months and...and I'm tired of sneaking around."

"Uh-huh. You and um... _what's his name_ are on speaking terms again, right?"

"I'm tired of sneaking around," she repeated, boring holes into Sam's skull.

"Yeah?"

"Yeah."

"I'm not," he said, stepping forward.

Jules gave him a push with both arms and barked, "No!"

"Does _what's his name_ let you wrap your legs around his neck?"

"Mac is my husband. You're not."

"Huh," he grunted. "So...no more?"

"No more."

He leaned his head back, stared at the crescent moon...and chuckled.

"What's funny?" asked Jules.

"Nutin, doll. I'm just wonderin' if I'll remember this conversation in the morning. We might need to have it again."

"Can you at least _pretend_ to understand the situation _I'm_ in?"

"Got it," Sam cheeped...which wasn't true because he figured she'd come around and...well, he _sorta_ liked her. But maybe she was right. Their relationship began and ended at his base house. The sneaking around didn't bother him, but Jules had to scurry home to _what's his name_ and...still...given time...she'd miss him. Or maybe she wouldn't. Easy come, easy go. Or not so easy. Hell's bells, what did _what's his name_ have-

As if reading his mind, Jules said, "I have children with Mac."

"Hey, fine," he said, retreating with arms raised. "I'm going inside. I'll see you...whenever."

"Hold on," she said, grabbing his sleeve. "I have to ask you something."

"I've whiskey to drink, several whiskies, and Ted Williams to yak about. No offense, but I'd rather listen to Fred than talk to you."

"But it's important."

"I thought you already covered the important stuff."

She took a deep breath and then asked, "Did one of your balloons crash near Foster's Ranch?"

Sam frowned and asked, "Balloons?"

"Your research balloons. You told me about them once, remember?"

"Heh. You wanna talk about _balloons_? Christ, are you kidding?"

"I'm not kidding. I think one crashed near Foster's Ranch?"

"Good night, Jules," he said, patting her left shoulder.

"I'm _serious_ ," she hissed.

"Foster's Ranch, you said? Where the hell is Foster's Ranch?"

"North of town. Listen, Mac found something a few days ago. He's been bringing pieces of...whatever it is...and putting it in the shed. I told him it wasn't a good idea because it's government property but..."

" _If_ it is a balloon, and I'm certain it's not-"

"Mac said there's a balloon on the ground but it's...you know...flat-"

"Deflated?"

"Deflated, yes."

"Uh-huh. What else?"

"There's a lot of pieces and a...a big...box thing."

"A big box thing?"

"I don't know. I'm just telling you what Mac said. He has a few...they're like..." she spread her arms shoulder width, raised eyebrows, and stammered, "...um...you know...like rope."

"Rope?"

"And a pole."

"Fat lot of good the shit will do unless _what's his name_ plans on studying sound waves and ultra-violet radiation."

"Did one of them crash?"

"No," he said, shaking his head. "We haven't lost a balloon. Matter of fact...um..."

"What?"

"Forget it. I can't talk about launch schedules."

"Maybe one of your balloons crashed, Sam. Wouldn't you like to know?"

"Fuck," Sam muttered. "All right, I'm gonna tell you something, but you can't blab to _anybody._ "

"Who am I going to tell?"

"Just...fine. The only reason I'm telling you this is to help...you know...soothe your mind or sumptin. We haven't launched in a month...maybe five weeks...or six. I can't remember the last time, okay?"

"Are you sure?"

"Positive. I track them damn things, and not one of them damn things has gone skyward _or_ missing."

"Then...then what do you think it is?"

"What do I think it is? I think it's a pile of junk. Are there markings, symbols... _anything_?"

"I don't know. I don't think so."

"There you have it. It's not the Army's. Maybe somebody's dumping garbage."

"Mac said it's deep on Foster's property. Untouched acreage. They've started running cattle deep because of the drought. Nobody's been back there but Mac and J.B."

"Who's J.B.?"

"J.B. Foster. It's his land."

"I've no idea what those two found, but it ain't a balloon. This J.B. fella best call the sheriff. I bet he has a squatter problem. Injuns or hobos."

"When have you seen a hobo in the desert?"

"Then it's an injun. You should talk to Butch-"

"Can you at least ask around?"

"Who am I gonna ask?"

"Your general or-"

"My general? Hmm," he said, rubbing chin, "...which one should I call. MacArthur? Bradley? Eisenhower? I mean, they're all dying to have a conversation with Sam Pix and-"

"Do you think I'm making this up?"

"I never said _what's his name_ didn't find sumptin. But a balloon?"

"Yes."

"Jeez...fine, _sometimes_ balloons crash around these parts. Alamogordo sends weather balloons with radiosonde up...maybe... _maybe_ one of theirs came down on Foster's land. But those fellas keep tabs on 'em, just like we keep watch on ours. When did _what's his name_ find this pile of junk?"

"Couple days ago, I think. Tuesday or Wednesday."

"See, somebody woulda been there lickety-split by now. And since nobody's not, and there ain't even markings on whatever _what's his name_ found...what do you want me to say?"

"Can you make a call?"

" _Argh_..." he grumbled. Phoning one of the docs wouldn't bust Sam's hump, but then he'd get dragged into checking the thing out and...it'd be nutin but junk, like he thought. "If I remember in the morning," he said, raising a finger, "I'll talk to someone in the lab."

"Thank-"

" _Except_ there's one thing I _just_ remembered. It's the weekend."

"So?"

"There ain't a brainiac in the lab on a weekend unless we have numbers to run. It'll have to wait 'til Monday."

"Monday?"

"It ain't going anywhere. Just tell _what's his name_ to stop picking at the junk. Sweet like candy? Are we good? Can I go back inside?"

"Well...there's something else."

"Cryin' out loud, Jules. What?"

"Mac's sick. I think it's because of the balloon. You know, like radiation or-"

Sam chuckled and then said, "No. No radiation, nothing weird. The only thing unusual is your imagination."

"You're certain?"

"One-thousand percent. Anything else?"

She didn't look placated but answered, "I guess not."

"You sure you don't need any help under the hood?"

Julie shook her head.

"Welp," he said, "I guess you best get home to _what's his name_. See ya, doll."

# 2. Operation Mogul

Our pal Sammy Pix opened his peepers, blinked, and stared into darkness. Somewhere above, the ceiling loomed. If he found the bed...which he had, according to the sheets and pillow...then after his eyes adjusted, he'd be gazing at a circular, rust-colored water stain. In the meantime, he took a personal inventory:

Throat as dry as the Virgin Mary's kootchar...check.

Heartbeat thumping inside temple...check.

Joints achy...check.

Fucking miserable...check.

Sometimes our pal was _plain old miserable_. Most of time, he wasn't. Either way, being miserable meant: time to roll out of bed. Or get off the floor. For some reason, his internal alarm clock always roused before dawn. It didn't matter what when Sam passed out, and he didn't know anyway, but damn if he wasn't up at the same motherhumping time every morning. _Up and at 'em; early bird; healthy, wealthy and wise..._ the colloquialisms irritated because Sam didn't want to move so much as an eyelash.

The old man had a word for when you got tore up, delivered from his cottonmouth with a special emphasis on the second syllable:

Hum-dinged.

***

"Oh, Sammy boy, your Father hath a _humdinger_ of a headache," Pa often proclaimed. This gritty personal assessment was conveyed after bleary-eyed Walt poured himself into the cockpit of his canary-yellow Stearman 4 and raked a wad of long-cut between cheek and gum. Thereafter, Sam forked over the goggles and the satchel as Dad exercised his mouth and tried to clear ears.

Walt Pix flew mail for the U.S. Postal Service. Ifin you had a letter delivered to your home between 1928 and 1934, and ifin you lived in central or southern Mississippi, Walt Pix prolly had his hands on it at one moment in time...

His tremoring, _humdinged_ , sweaty hands.

From the time he was knee-high, Sam couldn't remember a time his old man wasn't supping sumptin-sumptin.

The factual? Pa taught Sam how to fly sipping from a jug of sour mash.

The actual factual? Sam be a proficient, _humdinged_ pilot.

See, Pa often garbled: _if you can fly loaded, you'll be pro-fish-ant..._ and damn if he didn't make Sam prove _pro-fish-ant-see_. Three-point landings, wheel landings, landings in cotton fields and on dirt roads. Sam could land the Stearman on a motherfucking daffodil.

Our little hero could do anything with that biplane; even better, he could do anything whilst a mite buzzed.

At fifteen, Sam took his checkride with a CAA examiner from Greenville -one of Dad's buddies- and the three of them had a couple of drinks "for good luck" beforehand. Afterward, they had a few more. Believe you me, if there's one basic truth in life it be this: there ain't nutin to do in Greenville but get hummed, then dinged and then _humdinged_.

Pa was prolly _humdinged_ when he bit the big one because there sure as shit wasn't a good reason to fly an open canopy airplane into a thunderstorm. Since parts of the Stearman were found damn near thirty miles straight-line distance from where Walt Pix's body, his tin of chew, and the fuselage came raining down on Belzoni, Sam hoped Walt had been drunk. No other reason made sense.

See, Dad lectured: _Penetrating a storm is the patron sin of flyin'_. They were sitting on the porch one humid summer afternoon -Sam was twelve- when the old man pointed at the rumblin', _light-meat_ shootin' towering clouds dun yonder.

"Look at dem mothers, Sammy," the old man said. "Watch dem clouds. Up day go, dem big ole bitches. What a sight, eh?"

By God, the old man spit facts! Sam had never studied dem clouds before. Like a scaredy-cat, he'd go running when bad weather approached...running to the cellar with Ma and his sisters. Watching nature work, watching dem storms blossom, watching dem big cotton balls with upset stomachs...

Watching dem clouds hypnotized.

"You know why day boil like dat?" Walt asked. "You know why day bubble and simmer?"

"No, sir," Sammy whispered.

"All dem carbuncles are full of updrafts what cause the _tur-bew-lance_. Little pebble inside could go clear to the top of the cloud, and some of dem tops near go to space."

"Space?"

"Damn near. Day get way high, boy."

"How high?"

Dad shrugged and said, "Higher than we can fly. Reckon sixty thousand feet. Up dat far, the air is cold, kay. Water freezes and the top pops out dem chunks of ice. Now, dat _tur-bew-lance_ I told you' bout is whirling. You mix dat ice and dat rough air and dats the reason hail be fallin' miles from a storm. See the top of this 'er one? See how the anvil is floatin' like thread towards the east? Dat anvil be tellin' ya which way the wind is. You flyin', you go around the other side 'er cuz flyin' under dat anvil gets you a nasty rash."

Sam whistled. Boy was his old man smart...

But even smart men catch a dose of the unlucky bug.

He wondered how high Pa flew when the Stearman got snatched in the maw of the storm. Did the old man ride the wave of air to the tip-top, sixty thousand feet above the ground, almost to space? Did the Stearman tear ass to Earf covered in rime and clear ice? Did the Stearman break apart? Did the old man freefall in the clouds? Sam pondered Walt's fate a lot and concluded his old man had a helluva ride to whatnot.

_What a way to go,_ our pal's sodden adolescent mind gushed on many a _humdinged_ night.

And even tho little Sammy didn't have a death wish way back when, kicking off in an airplane seemed a suitable destiny.

Before the war it seemed a forgone conclusion: he landed a job doing aerial survey for the State of Mississippi in the FSA, a New Deal spawn from the fancy pants FDR. It wasn't a bad program; Roosevelt put the poor to work. Planting, tilling, controlled burns...blessed labor for the Negroes and whites too broke to feed their families. The Farm Security Administration provided the plane. Sam had been one of five commercial pilots in Washington County, Mississippi, and he had the honor of flying a beat-to-shit Aeronca C-3 for three bucks a day. Altho surveying trumped picking cotton, the added risks were tenfold.

Once, he hit a flock of blackbirds going into Yazoo City and put his girl down on a gravel road after the prop hitched. There were feathers and hunks of fowl pasted across the empennage; the propeller got a little dinged; the crankshaft got uncranked. He spent an hour plucking gack off the Aeronca and another three futzing with the E-113 powerplant until the flat-twin piston seemed right as rain.

The subsequent takeoff and shallow climb went without incident, and Sammy started counting his chickens. Around a thousand feet, tho, the engine seized and vomited oil. There hadn't been a hiccup or nutin...lickity split, pleasant vibration turned to silence. Sam didn't even damn the Lord...there wasn't time...but luck was on his side, somewhat, and he found a furrowed field of parched soil. All he need do was glide the hunk of junk over some listing telephone poles...

He felt the front wheels kiss the wires and pushed the yoke forward to prevent the tailwheel from snagging. The windscreen filled with land, which was naught a sight any pilot wants to see, even a humdinged one. The plane hit hard, kicked up a cloud of dirt, and Sam fractured his right arm and beak. When he crawled from the smoldering, upended wreck with the assistance of bedraggled planters, Sam heard them telephone wires twanging.

Later, during his stint bombing the bejesus out of the Huns, Sam sorta regretted he hadn't kicked off that afternoon cuz kicking off over Europe didn't seem like such a hot deal. By then, tho, everyone be kicking off so...the notion of picking poisons put termination into perspective. Compared to getting cleaved by phosphorus shells, gutted by a bayonet, or being roasted in one of them SS camps...well, sir, Sam concluded the odds were better he'd outlast the war in the sky. It didn't matter what the Good Lord threw at him: flak, Jerries in jets, _Die Glocke_ , flocks of geese, wing fallin' off...better to face those things than what lurked on Earf.

If the conflict taught our pal anything, it was this: straddling the demarcation between existence and naught made a person keen...and it also made a person kinda kooky. Some fellas turned to God; others embraced hedonism. Providence, pussy...they both served the same purpose. Sam happened to find the pursuit of pleasure more rewarding. The payoff came sooner rather than later, and there weren't all kinds of stoopid rules and whatnots to follow.

It also didn't help Ma found the good Lord after Dad shit the bed; Ma also found one of the good Lord's shepherds -a reedy, outspoken fella named Preacher Post- who was generous enough to move the entire family into his big house on Levee Road. The thought crossed Sam's mind Ma Pix and the Preacher had been friends long before ole Walt kicked off since Preacher Post made it a point to spend the first few nights after Dad's death in their house counseling Mamma all hours of the night. This and their moaning sounded a mite blasphemous. This _and_ his sister Sue being born seven months after Dad's death, complete with the trademark Post ears. This _and_ the Post skin color, which was a smidge darker than Walt Pix. This _and_ the fact Ma didn't get immaculated and if she did, it wasn't by no Negro Jesus because Jesus prolly wasn't black and if he was, Sam knew Jesus (Black, White or Redskin) wasn't in the business of knocking up women from the Mississippi Delta.

Ma got nutty then...or nuttier. She'd been sorta looney before the old man died, but Sam gathered Walt Pix ignored her anomalous penchants cuz professional boozers don't care about nutin but their own intemperance. Hooking up with Preacher Post -and the Preacher thought drinking was a naughty, no good Sin- meant Ma's predilections got the red-carpet treatment. Lo, she ranted about faith and walking in the light; she spouted crap like: ' _The Lord has a plan for you_ , _and you don't know what it is, Sammy._ '

Her incessant homilies drove our adolescent pal batty; still, he held his tongue for a spell. But, at last, there came a breaking point...

After almost kicking off in the Aeronca, he and Ma engaged in a spirited discussion about fate, damnation, and sundry pious philosophies.

The conversation veered in said direction when a humdinged Sam returned home from the hospital. Ma smelled the booze on his breath and remarked, "Getting tight isn't a suitable way to say thank you to The Lord."

" _Thank you_?!" Sam squawked, waving his sling. "What should I thank Him for? Breakin' my arm? Breakin' my nose? Breakin' my plane? I ain't gonna be flyin' anytime soon, which means I ain't gonna be makin' coin. Pardon me if I don't thank Him."

And then Ma spouted the customary b and s: "The Lord has a plan for you, and you don't know what it is, Sammy."

"Heh. If this is His plan, His plan stinks. Besides, who's to say me gettin' tight isn't part of His plan, huh?"

"Sammy, the Lord tests us. He tests with calamity; He tests with desire; He tests with avarice. Those who remain staid in the face of these tests prove their faith to Him."

"You're telling me His plan is a buncha tests?"

"Tests what prove your faith."

"Jeez," he moaned. "What you're sayin' is stoopid."

"It ain't stupid. The Lord's way is _the_ answer. Once you understand, you'll stop questioning _why_ things happen; once you understand, you'll accept the course of life. Our hardships become easier to stomach when you trust the Lord has a plan."

Sam scratched his ear and subdued an urge to mock his simple mother. Not only did her logic hurt his head, he understood why Pa spent so much time away from the old lady.

Ma wasn't done, though, and she sermonized: "Look what happened to your pappy. He failed His tests, and we suffered for his weaknesses. But I remained devoted to The Lord, and The Lord delivered Mister Post."

He wanted respond: _Pa got smeared across the shitty Mississippi soil because he was prolly humdinged when he punched into the storm_...but he knew she'd counter with sumptin idiotic. So, our pal kept his mouth sealed and stared at his stompers while Ma concluded:

"You need mind my words, Sammy. Let your heart tell you what's right because the Lord speaks through the heart. And don't be looking cross at the Preacher. He's a good man."

Mister Post might've been a good man, but Sam reckoned the Preacher was, at the least, a covetous one. A man didn't have to be corrupt to be carnal. But ifin Ma was happy, Sam had no problem with him. A lot of the crackers in Greenville did, but they needed to stay out of the Pix-Post funny business and concentrate on their own problems. Crowing about who did what with whom and which skin color to do it with be squandered breath.

A few months after The Lord tested Sam with death (and unemployment cuz there wasn't a high demand for one-armed men to pick cotton and till soil, which meant our pal spent weeks sitting on his ass until his cast came off), The Lord tested Preacher Post. When the Klan planted a burning cross on the Post lawn one night, Sam knew who was responsible...and so did the Preacher. Say what you would about Preacher Post, but the man wasn't intimidated. Breathing fire, he grabbed his guns and snarled, _'Even if it gets me kilt, I'm fixin' to handle this nonsense!'_ While Sam respected the tenaciousness, he sweettalked Mister Post off the suicidal ledge and ordered the Preacher to take Ma and their miscolored brood somewhere safe for the distant future, somewhere far from Greenville.

His school chums were Klan goons and so were their fathers and their uncles and cousins and the whole mess of family tree limbs tangled worse than Spanish Moss. Sam reckoned the Preacher got a reprieve from a lynching because Sam was a tangential acquaintance. The lit cross was a warning, and The Klan didn't give many warnings. The next time they came calling in their bedspreads would be the last time for Preacher Post.

Sam decided there wasn't gonna be a next time. He drove to the airport, commandeered a Stinson Reliant 10 used by the Greenville FD as a fire spotter, and took off -in the middle of the night- with a bundle of bricks on the seat next to him.

First stop: The Grand Wizards house. Sam flew low, followed twisty Bot Road out of Greenville, and circled over Dave Reed's homestead until the whole clan stood outside. Somebody on the ground (prolly Dave but maybe one of his stoopid boys) lit him up with a torch. Sam couldn't see their ugly faces, which was a shame because their reactions after he chucked two bricks through the tin roof of the dilapidated shithole would've been glorious. Next, he winged to Dwight Clifford's and then Stanford Crowder's and...well, you get the picture. Sam ran out of bricks after six houses, but the point had been made.

While satisfying, the counterattack attracted the attention of John Law. A couple of Washington County's finest were waiting for Sam when he landed, and he surrendered without a fuss. Hauled to the station, he expected a night in the pokey and a couple black eyes. But instead of laying the smackdown, the Sheriff of Washington County (a rare member of local law enforcement who wasn't a Klucker) kinda sorta took pity on our hero.

The lawman said: "What with yer old man passing and yer Ma takin' up with the colored preacher...yea, it's dun made you foolish. Regardless, bein' foolish doesn't mean yew can steal government property and destroy domiciles." He slapped a bus ticket in Sam's hand, puffed chest, and then said, "This here ticket is one way to Memphis. I called a buddy there, an Army recruiter, who is going to meet yew at the terminal. Yew best arrive, yew best sign yer Sam Pix on the dotted line, and yew best not show yer face in Greenville, Greenwood, Yazoo City...hell, Jackson...Winona...and..."

Sam nodded as the Sheriff named damned near every city, town, and unincorporated locality in Mississippi. On the bus ride north, he couldn't help but smile. Leaving Ma wasn't the best outcome, but she'd take succor in The Lord or sumptin. Getting banished from the State of Mississippi took a special kind of person. And, yeah, Sam was proud of this feat. Concerning the Army and implied enlistment...he decided there were worse ways to make a buck and get three squares. And since the United States wasn't at war...

The recruiter turned out to be a swell fella named Ralph Weatherwax, and Mister Weatherwax laughed like a lunatic when Sam recounted what landed him in hot water.

"You know," Weatherwax said after collecting his breath, "I got the call from Ray Bob saying you needed some discipline, but I wasn't told you're a pilot."

"I _was_ a pilot," Sam corrected. "I crashed my plane up a couple months ago and the FSA ain't got the funds to scrounge me a new one."

"Crashed? What happened?"

"Engine failure. Heh, matter of fact, I executed two forced landings that day. Number two was a tad harder than the first one, tho. Anyway, I haven't been in the air since."

"You wanna get back in the cockpit?"

Sam snorted and then said: "Damn straight. I hate bein' landlocked."

"Listen, the Army has an Air Corps Aviation Program for guys like you. Provided you keep your nose to the grindstone and not pull something stupid, it's the fast track to a commission. Trust me," Weatherwax added with a wink, "the perks are better than what your average grunt receives."

It seemed too good to be true, but Sam wasn't about to let the opportunity pass. And getting rewarded for impetuous behavior added a caveat to the whole affair. After boot camp, he skated through Primary School at Fort Randolph, then Technical School in Illinois. The Army's thin cadet pool meant Sam had almost double the flight time of the next recruit in his class. His skills in the cockpit (what amounted to rudimentary airmanship, in Sam's opinion) didn't go unnoticed; during the summer of '41, he received orders for Kelly Field, Advanced Flying School, 39th Squadron. After the Nips hit Pearl Harbor, he caressed the satisfying sensation the endless training would be put to use in due time. _Cocky_ , be the word, and Sam felt adept enough to take on the Axis powers. The notion the enemy shot back didn't bother _in the least._

One of his first instructors in the 39th was a salty Jew named Barry Goldwater. There was no _humdinged_ flying in the Army but, as Goldwater repeated _many times: 'There's no old, bold pilots and Army fliers must be bold or else they're old and being an old pilot in the Army means you lack bold.'_ All of this, once the words were untangled, trumpeted: _Fly Bold or Go Home!_ Being bold was like flying _humdinged_ and this kinda airmanship be right up Sam's yazoo. But one thing Sam didn't learn until he had to dance for the old man: bein' bold didn't justify stoopidity.

Being bold (Sam's opinion), or stoopid (the Army's take), got his ass in a pickle while flying out of Hamilton Field with Dick Bong. Sam had designs to pilot fighters and transitioned to the P-38 in the spring of '42. One beautiful afternoon, Dick and the little devil on Sam's shoulder talked him into taking a scenic tour beneath the Golden Gate Bridge and down Market Street at _about_ 50 feet...or so he later explained to General Kenney. Kenney cried bullshit; the linen scattered off the clotheslines of twenty livid women didn't get strewn by magic...or by the wake of Lockheed P-38 at 50 feet.

Since Sam had seen one of the women (and could draw the star-like birthmark on her belly), he wasn't going to argue. Sure, he mighta been a touch lower than 50. And sure, _maybe_ he deserved a slap on the wrist. _Maybe_ even a loss of liberty for a month. But getting chewed a new one, getting busted _back_ to 2nd Lieutenant, losing liberty _and_ then suffering the embarrassment of reassignment to "Fairy Command"...well, this _wasn't_ an apt punishment. While the rest of his squadron flew to England, Sam got stuck transporting equipment across the U.S. for thirteen months (in the _right seat_ , by the way) until he tunneled out of the doghouse. Digging out meant copious groveling and toeing the line; he found action, at last...but it wasn't flying fighters. It meant he sat his ass in the cockpit of a fat turd with snuff in his gums and Jerries taking pot shots. It meant he got a little envious of the P-51 fliers...and even the Kraut pilots with jets and other things he would've given both nuts and half his pecker to put hands on.

Being stoopid and bold in a B-17 laden with bombs was a bad idea. If Sam been alone, he wouldn't have cared. But his crew had loved ones so he flew the bomber like it carried sleeping babies. One day, Sam promised the devil sitting on his shoulder, he'd get back to stoopid, bold flying. After the war, when stoopid, bold pilots were needed to test fly, it looked like he'd get the chance.

Then Vera Pederson and his _entire_ pecker met. Sam happened to be attached to said appendage and General Pederson happened to be married to said Vera. After _that,_ it didn't matter if Sam strapped an A-bomb to his chest and marched into the Kremlin to have tea and crumpets with Uncle Joe. This doghouse had barbed wire wrapped around the doggie door. Sam wasn't digging out no matter what he did.

***

Humdinged.

Sam rolled out of bed, shook his head and pulled the curtain from the window. Nutin. Nutin but darkness, creepy creatures and _humdinged_ idiots. The sun showed its light around five bells in July, but there wasn't the faintest glow of dawn. He used to sleep through a hangover, but those days were over...as were the days of _waking_ hungover. No, ole Sam was still drunk from the previous evening. The hangover would hit around lunch. Then he'd slug through the remainder of the afternoon moving like a sloth in molasses. Twelve hours from now, give-or-take, he'd be planted in the Tumbleweed and the cycle would repeat itself...

Forever.

It wasn't like he had to have facilities intact. Sam wasn't flying anything but balloons, and they flew themselves. And he listened to recordings. Lots of recordings. Hours of static mixed with Morse code. The balloons, released from the airfield, floated into the stratosphere armed with disk microphones and radio transmitters. He was told these experiments measured the propagation of sound. To be exact: how radio waves got distorted by pressure and distance. The physics...pure mumbo-jumbo. The scientists could've sketched a calculus derivative tellin' Sam to go fuck himself and he would've been none-the-wiser. He understood basic behavior: Bernoulli, Newton's 3rd Law, rates of change over distance...the nuts-and-bolts of flying. This mindboggling math stuff, like religion, hurt Sam's head. The civilian doctors, Peoples and Crary, explained it to Sam like they were talking about building tinker toys. Yes, so simple even a retard from Greenville _should_ understand. Problem be, Sam had no clue what they were saying.

Operation Mogul was _supposed_ to detect the long-wave sound patterns of Soviet atomic bombs; the government spent wheelbarrows of greenbacks to fund the project. Sam listened to noises, made marks on his graphs and calculated speed-to-sound with a slide rule. He watched the balloons go up, come down, and then he collected the recording devices.

"The theory is, sound has minimal change in properties at a constant temperature and pressure," Dr. Peoples informed after Sam grumbled once (and only once), _what the hell is the point of this_. And when our old pal blinked and scratched his head, the good doctor added, "We're testing these models with our balloon applications. The problem? The balloons refuse to cooperate."

When Sam arrived in January, the balloons were rubber and looked like giant prophylactics. Sometimes, like a condom, the rubber leaked. The helium seeped through the skin and the balloons lost altitude. The doctors complained non-stop about variation. The _whatchamacallit_ tests weren't accurate because the balloons had minds of their own. They crashed or drifted all over tarnation. People in Southern New Mexico found Mogul balloons three or four times a month. This led to design modifications, polyethylene replaced rubber, and ballast was controlled by barometric _doohickeys_.

"Once we figure out how sound is distorted," Dr. Crary said over a beer one evening at the "Weed, "we'll be able to listen to Soviet activity. If Joe Stalin passes gas, we'll not only hear it, we'll be able to tell what time and where. My gut tells me Uncle Joe is a gassy bastard." As far as physicists went, Crary was more Sam's speed: he drank, smoked and chased skirts.

"Whose idea is this?" Sam asked. "Balloons are...they're for birthday parties, not spying."

"I can't say," Crary responded all sneaky like.

"Ah, I see. One of those Tough Shit conversations."

Crary tapped the tip of his bulbous nose and then said, "I can tell you we've been using balloons for weather observations and they're amazing. And, believe it or not, they can be employed as weapons."

"We were using 'em during the war?"

"Not as weapons. Army balloons had passive roles. Radar, tactical observation...nothing aggressive."

"The Krauts?"

Crary shook his head.

"Them Krauts are smart, doc. I saw shit over Germany and...well, I saw shit."

"Do tell."

"Tough Shit."

"Yes, and the same goes for my information."

"The fuck with all this crap," Sam griped. "Everyone with their secrets."

"A necessary evil."

"If you say so."

"Hmm...what if I told you the real work of the future is being done here?"

"The Tumbleweed?"

Crary jabbed his right pointer on the table for emphasis and said, "Here in New Mexico. The ability to study the upper atmosphere will yield gold for upcoming endeavors. They're bouncing jet airplanes off the ground in Nevada and California because the pilots and engineers don't understand the way physics work. We're collecting the _important_ pieces, Sam. You should feel honored to have the opportunity."

Sam almost spilled his beer. "Get the fuck out of here," he scoffed. "My dreams came to die in New Mexico, as did my career. When my commission is up, I'm splittin'. Sayonara. I'm headin' straight to Greenville to dust crops or sumptin."

"Then you'd be selling yourself short."

A wet raspberry sputtered from Sam's lips.

"You aren't listening to what I'm saying," lectured Crary. "This project has room for advancement. These balloons will have the capacity to go into the upper atmosphere soon. They'll be carrying people into the mesosphere! 50,000 meters!"

"I'm bad with the whole meters to feet thing."

"160,000 feet, give or take. Think of it!"

_Yeah, yeah,_ Sam thought. _Got it._ But he didn't and Crary shoulda known because Sam flew machines, not balloons. Despite Crary's pep talk, Sam dreamed of testing airplanes like his pals Dick Bong and Benny Green. It didn't matter ole Dick got turned into a red smudge in the desert 'cause his P-80 got cranky. Risk, danger, death...none of it concerned Sam. Yet he managed to muck it up so bad, the Army wouldn't let him near anything with two wings.

On mornings like these, he'd pad outside into the cool desert air and stare at the stars. Dry and crisp, even in July. Mississippi mornings in summer's core were warm and sticky. There wasn't a cool time of day. At dawn, wispy radiation fog shrouded the ground; the sun worked quick to shred the haze. By seven, sinister head took command. Sometimes, he kinda missed it.

Sam gazed up and thought about the old man. He wondered what it'd be like to taste the edge of the Earf. Maybe he should stick with Mogul. Another ten years from now he might get the chance to see space firsthand. But by then...by then he'd be in his forties and riding a _balloon_. It didn't seem worth the wait.

Ergo, what else was there to do but get _humdinged_?

# 3. Die Glocke

The Nazis were terrible humans, but they were smart sons-of-bitches. Even Benny Green couldn't argue this point and Benny hated Nazis. Sam didn't like them either, but one thing was certain: the U.S. military owed a lot to Kraut ingenuity. After the war, Sam got sent to D.C. to work as an adjutant in the Pentagon for the "Research and Development Board". He learned a lot of things in D.C., all of them "TOP SECRET", and all of 'em plum blew his artless mind.

_Z series computers, rockets, jet airplanes, helicopters, hydrogen peroxide air-independent propellant, schnorchal and countermeasures for submarines_...the list appeared endless.

"Ever heard of a sonic cannon?" General Wallace Walsh asked one morning between sips of Pentagon joe.

"Can't say I have," Sam answered.

"This thing used methane gas to produce sound waves. Stand too close and it'd scramble your insides."

Had the Krauts been given time, and it was a good thing they ran out of it, they would've developed a bomb like the ones the Army dropped on the Nips. Shit, Adolf could've mounted Mr. Atom on a rocket and fired it at London and perhaps D.C. But _perhaps_ wasn't the correct word: this _would've_ happened. And if the atom bomb didn't do a thorough enough job, the Krauts _would've_ mounted warheads packed with Cyclosarin or Tuban to finish whomever remained. The toxic nerve agents were capable of devasting large populations.

Yep, them Nazis had Big plans: by March 1945, the Kriegsmarine were fitting a catapult system designed to launch buzz bombs from U-boats. Dönitz deigned to sit his flotilla of subs along the East Coast and in the Gulf; instead of picking off merchant ships, the U-boat pickets were going to lob V-2's at major American cities for shits-and-giggles. Sam could've provided the Germans a few targets in Greenville, but the Nazis had bigger fish to fry than the white trash living on the Mississippi Delta. In fact, according to intelligence uncovered in Kiel after V-E Day, one of the Kraut subs gave it the ole college try. Rumor had it Florence, South Carolina (for God knew what reason), sat in the Nazi crosshairs, but wonky math turned the Type XII U-boat into a wet stain somewhere near the Outer Banks.

Submarines, rockets, sonic cannons, _et alia_ , the Third Reich packed a treasure chest bursting with technological marvels. The _et alia_ pearls be where Sam fit into the equation, by the way. As a _surviving_ witness to one of the more fantastic Luftwaffe flying machines, the Army hoped Sam could provide useful insight...or sumptin. He'd have rather dumped bombs on the bastards in Japan after the European Theater closed doors, but the carrot be dangled in front of his eyes: _help Uncle Sammy figure out how Die Glocke works, and you'll get to fly_ that thing _one day._

And, boy, would Sam fly the shit out of _that thing_. He'd zoom the crazy contraption to the top of Earf and, God-willing (like Ma believed), scrape the darkness of space. Maybe there'd be no scraping space; maybe Sam would shoot his narrow ass to the moon in _that thing_. It didn't seem a farfetched notion, either. No, sir. Those flying disks could go higher than a hick from Mississippi thought possible. But since he saw them operate _in situ_ , Sam knew this be no impossible dream.

***

Buried several kilometers beneath the tallest peak of the Harz mountains -The Brocken or Blocksburg- a tangle of tunnels snaked into massive caverns excavated by unlucky slave laborers spurned to work by their Nazi supervisors. Intelligence reported V-1 and V-2 rockets were assembled in the subterranean factories; other chambers housed munitions and miscellany artifacts. The natural, rugged exterior of the _mittelgebirge_ made The Brocken impervious to American bombs, but those sorties the 398th Bomb Squadron flew weren't meant to destroy the Nazi stores and trinkets.

No, the anti-personnel M41's (and the fifty odd fellas who died either dumping said bombs or escorting the bombers) meant to turn the entrenched SS Waffen tasked with protecting The Brocken into critter slop. Once cleaved of Krauts, the American Army would waltz into the mountain and clean house.

By late March 1945, the future appeared clear as fucking glass to everyone: Uncle Adolf, and his Nazi comrades, were living on borrowed time. Clear as fucking glass to _everyone_...but the Germans displayed profound stupidity or commendable obstinacy. Given what transpired in their death camps, it seemed (to Sam, at least) the Huns had forfeited their right to rub elbows with the rest of the world. The Nazis touted Master Race b and s but they meant to whittle civilization to a nub, and he harbored _zero_ guilt participating in their destruction.

Sam's transition from Ferry Command to VIII Bomber Command in England had been an arduous road. Further instruction and checkouts delayed deployment until September 1943. Another couple weeks waiting for a seat -time 1st Lieutenant Pix spent getting humdinged with other green airmen- meant more bit chomping. He listened to the stories of _old-timers_ (Sam considered anyone who completed more than one raid an old-timer) and attempted to stitch the tales into a semblance of veracity: the cacophony of engines, detonating flak, machine gun fire, the bombs high-pitched descent to Earf, crew chatter over the headset; visions of the fleet in coordinated flight, Jerry interceptors and escorts whizzing to-and-fro, the burst of ordinance below and the black puffs of flak at altitude. As it turned out, the _old-timer's_ matter-of-fact narration didn't paint the full picture. Adrenaline, composed of both fear and excitement, stoked the soul. There wasn't a moment aloft when something couldn't go wrong. And, no matter how much one tried to dampen edginess, it proved impossible to wind down after returning to the air field. The thrill of surviving one raid gave way, quick-like, to the realization (or _dread_...but Sam didn't like to use this word) one would run the gauntlet again in short order.

But all this could _only_ be appreciated _in situ._

He participated in six raids as copilot on the _Lucky Landis_ , including a stretch of horrendous action during the last three weeks of October 1943: 176 B-17's were obliterated, lost or scuttled, resulting in the death, capture or injury of almost 1,000 airmen. _Traumatic_ be the best word to describe this introduction to war, but Sam reminded himself, _'this is what you wanted',_ and trundled into the cockpit on steady legs. Anyway, what choice did he have?

And he wasn't afforded much time in the right seat before getting shoved into the left. With a dearth of _experienced_ pilots and the war reaching an axiomatic point, the brass blessed promotion quick-like. Bequeathed with the moniker "Captain" and granted prodigious luck, Sam managed to make it far longer in the left seat than he thought possible: thirteen months, all told...and it would've been fourteen had he not run into _Die Glocke_ over Saxony.

He flew three missions over Saxony in _Zoë Zinger_ -serial number 43 38172- his dependable B-17G with Zoë Mozert's tawdry likeness decorating the left side of the fuselage. Three raids over Saxony; _plus_ three dropping 500-pound M17 clusters on Munich; _plus_ three razing the French port of Lorient (home to thirty German submarine pens...which proved impenetrable to incendiary and explosive ordinance, so High Command decided to destroy the city and render resupply impossible); _plus_ three on French targets weeks before D-Day; _plus_ two on railroad stations in Belgium during the Battle of the Bulge; _plus_ one punching the tickets of oil refineries in Leipzig; _plus_ one against ball-bearing factories in Schweinfurt and another _plus_ one against Braunschweig during Big Week...totaled seventeen _plus_ missions for Sam, and his crew, in thirteen months of combat.

His crew, by the way, comprised a hodge-podge of Americana: copilot Benny Green and John White, the navigator, hailed from New York City. The remaining seven -five gunners, a bombardier, and a radio operator- sprang from places as foreign to a Mississippi boy as Saxony: Pierre, Rolla...Cairo, New York, to name a few. Some guys came and went, swapped from one craft to another, but the comradery and _genuine_ affinity made it difficult to reckon one, or all of them, might not return should things go south. When Sam watched this, that and the other Flying Fortresses take flak or get shredded by a Jerry, he tried to subdue the relief it wasn't _his_ plane with _his_ people doing the plunge. But it ate at him, both guilt and relief, until he assumed the bad juju would find a way to square the kitty.

Thus, he caressed a disconcerted sensation (not unusual, but more pressing than previous raids) in his stomach as the 398th worked to make The Brocken hospitable for good guys. Three raids in seventeen days...and, true to Sam's bad feeling, the third raid turned out to be the last raid, ever, for _Zoë Zinger._

The ball turret gunner, the kid from Cairo, was the first to see 'em. Sam had turned control over to Cecil Dawber and loaded dip into his mouth as the bombardier fixed to dump their potent load. With a dash of panic, Glenn Gray pipped over the headset:

"Jerries! Low! My...five...now six o'clock moving..."

Sam looked out the windscreen. He didn't see shit but snowy forest below. But, for good measure, he unbuckled his harness, leaned forward, and then asked, "Moving where?"

"Moving..."

"Where?"

"Up," Glenn said after a pause, although his inflection left open the chance he was proposing a question.

"Whadda ya mean _up_?"

"Straight up."

Sam and Benny exchanged a puzzled glance.

"Holy jizzum," Glenn muttered. "Should be in sight at your twelve in a second."

Benny saw them first. "There," he said, pointing at the horizon. Sam followed the finger and squinted...until...bingo, about 10 miles distant. Three little specks of sun glint looking...motionless. In other words:

"There headed at us," Benny pronounced.

"You see them?" Glenn asked.

Sam dropped the tin of snuff and the tobacco spilled across his lap. "Eh, bombardier," he garbled. "Eh...hustle your bustle, man. We're about to mix it up."

"Almost there," Dawber answered, in a whisper, with zero urgency.

Sam stared at the bitty pebbles and watched them get unbittier. The bastards were moving...and _fast_. He had tangled with jets during the Leipzig raid in late February and watched the Nazi super planes fly circles around the escorting P-51's. Though the rumors of jet aircraft were abundant, Sam hadn't seen one close-like until Leipzig. And he hadn't seen one in the weeks since.

Until now.

"Jets," muttered Sam.

"Jets," Benny seconded.

Their escort had eyes on and moved abeam the B-17 to intercept.

"Come on, bombardier," Sam urged. "Drop bombs."

"Almost there," Dawber repeated.

"These guys ain't fooling," Sam said, more to himself than Dawber. "They're comin' in hot."

"Thirty seconds, cap."

_Something...odd about 'em,_ our ole pal thought. If his peepers were to be trusted...it _looked_ like they didn't have wings. Or a vertical stabilizer.

He blinked eyes.

Then rubbed 'em.

For good measure he blinked again.

"What in tarnation?" Sam asked.

Pilots had reported strange things in the previous months: in November '44, the night fliers from the 415th described balls of light making rapid changes in speed and altitude. Sam thought they'd been hypoxic, but then other crews talked of similar encounters. Somehow the name "Foo Fighter" got smacked onto these unexplainable events, but High Command determined _Foo Fighters_ were either: St. Elmo's Fire, ball lightning, flak burning at altitude or a new Nazi weapon. In this order, too.

As Sam watched the bogies, he thought of a better tag: _Flying Saucer._

"Maybe...sunspots, Sam?" Benny suggested.

But sunspots didn't accelerate. Or fly in a not so synchronized triangle formation. Or fire tracers...

"Contact!" Glenn hollered, squeezing an impotent burst from the Browning .50 caliber.

The P-51 to starboard was shredded like a sieve and began a slow, loping spiral to the ground. As the saucers streaked past (like stones skipping on the surface of water), they dumped rounds into the right wing and tail of _Zoë_. Then they shot straight up, like a string yanked them; slacked-jawed, Sam craned his neck to follow the Jerries incredible ascent as his B-17 lurched to the right.

Chatter erupted in the headset as the crew reported what amounted to redundant damage reports. Sam ignored the hysterical yapping; he forgot where his ass be (snug in a damaged airplane at twenty-something thousand feet and descending not so slow like, for the record) and whistled low and slow. Then he looked at Benny and asked, "What the _fuck_ were those things?"

His copilot, eyes wide and face drained of blood, asked, "You wanna compare notes, or do you wanna see what we have left to work with?"

It could've been worse, all things considered, and losing two engines wasn't cause for panic. The outermost powerplant, number four, had been shredded and the prop, stuck in coarse pitch, created absurd drag. Number three caught fire, but Benny shut down the engine with a shaky hand. Though the governor worked as advertised and the prop feathered, _Zoë Zinger_ wasn't keen on maintaining altitude. Worse, the tail had been shot to shit; rudder application, keeping the plane coordinated and the inclinometer centered, required both pilots to apply constant pressure on the left foot pedal. By the time they landed, Sam's leg had turned into a wet noodle. It took five days for strength to return to the jangled cane.

Two tons lighter after Dawber jettisoned the bombs, _Zoë Zinger_ arrested descent and responded to control inputs. Electing to bypass airfields in France due to low ceilings and poor visibility, Sam and Benny nursed the poor girl to Nuthampstead with a humdinger of a story.

But there was a moment of trepidation when the thought of bailing seemed safer than remaining in the plane. Of course, dropping into the hands of the SS opened a new can of worms. Benny Green wasn't keen on this idea and who could blame him?

"Before we jump," Sam told him, trying to drum levity into the situation, "you better lose your Jew star necklace or our pals below are gonna melt it into a bullet and shoot you with it."

"Are you nuts?" Benny howled. "I'm not jumping! No fucking way! Oh, geez! We gotz to make it to Nuthampstead..."

Hence, the conversation Sam recounted at the Weed...

***

Pursing lips, General Jimmy Doolittle, commander of the Eighth Air Force, leaned forward on his elbows. Benny Green's hyper description of the encounter, peppered with a lot of _um's_ and _geez's_ ( _Um, geez, sir, um, we, um, geez, the Jerries, um, they were cooking and um...)_ , triggered a dumb thought in Sam's head: Benny sounded a mite slow and slash or s _toopid_ ; Helen Keller would've provided better testimony than Sam's rattled copilot.

At last, Benny spit out the kernel of the story. Sam, standing at a semblance of attention (his right leg shook like he had the palsy) studied the General's face with shifty eyes and restrained an urge to grab the old man by the lapels. He had the utmost respect for Doolittle but the General looked... _perturbed_ , like Sam and Benny were _wasting his time_. The old man didn't understand...and when the old man didn't understand, the old man became crabby. Ergo, Sam concluded, the old man would turn crabbiness into a pointed lecture or sumptin a tad harsher.

This deduction wasn't drawn from thin air. Sam knew the General's mannerisms because he'd been on the wrong end of a reaming once or a dozen times since arriving in Great Britain. Nutin serious, no dereliction of duty or UA b and s. Grab ass shit, the kinda stuff _most_ fellas did but never got called to do the carpet dance.

It took Sam Pix awhile to comprehend the priggish "Kings" from the RAF hacks who strutted like they were peacocks. _Or_ , the prissy Brits didn't reckon Sam's version of English be decipherable. What Sam identified, and wasn't afraid to make known (this be understood beyond a shadow of doubt, dialect or naught), was the ole red-carpet treatment lacked for Uncle Sam's warriors. Seeing as the Brits best maneuver in the war was a retreat from France, they could've been a little more cordial and a lot less vain. Some Brits took offense to this, and other generalizations Sam shared, on occasion, after several pints of tepid ale. Their solution to tattle on him always struck Sam as childish and the reason Uncle Sam carried the weight of the world on his broad shoulders at this precarious time in history. Point being, Sam hadn't feather ruffled in months, but Doolittle's pissy mannerisms remained the same...

"Excuse me, sir," Sam said, taking an itty step forward after Benny sealed his worthless trap.

Doolittle's eyes narrowed.

"I think," continued Sam with tact, "Benny's...pardon me...Lieutenant Green's account...could use a touch of polish."

"Please, captain, enlighten," implored Doolittle. "As I understand, three _ovals_ , flying _very_ fast, used your airplane for target practice."

"More or less but...but they looked like flying saucers and-"

"Huh? Flying...what's-it?"

"Saucers, sir. Two plates lying atop each other with a bulge in the middle. I reckon the pilot sits there. I watched them approach and pass. Then they went straight up," Sam explained, snapping his fingers. "Incredible maneuverability, sir."

"Uh-huh. They were moving so fast, these saucers, nobody else in the box noticed 'em. Eleven other bombers, fifteen escorts, and you two were the only witnesses?"

"Well, sir, we were exterior high element. And the P-51 pilot would tell you ifin he wasn't kilt. Ball turret PFC saw 'em. Our plane didn't get shot-to-shit by a phantom."

"But the rest of your crew? _Nothing._ I think you saw jets, Captain Pix. A...a...new type...but a jet."

"I'd say it's new, all right. No wings, no tail, no engines."

Doolittle sat back, folded hands behind his head, and sighed.

"I know how it sounds," Sam said, "and I'm the first to dismiss chatter out of pocket, but these things aren't a figment of imagination."

"Do you know how many times I've listened to bullshit about Foo Fighters? Too many to count. Now...now you want me to believe they have the capacity to engage? Hogwash."

"Sir-"

"Here's the scoop," the General said, rubbing his bald head. "Not a word leaves _either_ of your lips. Not a word to _anyone._ No mention of flying saucers in letters, phone calls, pillow talk...not a peep. Am I clear?"

"Yes, sir," Benny answered.

Doolittle pointed at Sam.

"Right, sir. I'll keep the lip zipped."

"I'm going to need a report from the two of you, signed and dated. Include an illustration. Have it finished by the day after next."

"For something you believe doesn't exist?" asked Sam.

"Captain," growled Doolittle, "you're dismissed. As are you, Lieutenant Green."

Benny spun on his heels, but Sam remained in the same spot and cheeped, "Just so I know, sir, what's the plan the next time we get in a rub-a-dub with these fellers? Ain't no way to shoot something going ten times our speed."

"You, Captain, are without a plane, and I'm sad to report the odds of finding one again before this war is kaput appear slim and none. Therefore, I suggest you write your report, attend briefings, and keep your mouth shut. Now, send in the ball turret gunner on your way out. I need to chat with him."

Forty-eight hours later, when Sam submitted the statement, a nameless hulk of a man wearing the rank of corporal snatched it from his hand and read the chicken scratch with a blank face. Then he balled the paper and stuffed it into the trashcan.

Sam tried humor: "My teachers used to do the same thing with my book reports-"

"Shut up," the corporal growled.

"Sir," Sam said with a straight face.

"Sir?"

"Yeah... _sir_ , corporal. I reckon you know how this works. I'm an officer, you're an E-4 and...shit, didn't you learn how to address your superiors in boot camp?"

The corporal took a step forward, balled fists, and then asked, "How about I teach you what I learned in boot camp, _sir_?"

"Enough, ladies," Doolittle scolded. "Captain Pix, this man isn't a corporal."

"Whadda mean?" Sam drawled. "Lookit the chevrons on his arm, sir."

"He's from the OSS, Captain."

"Eh? So...am I supposed to salute him?"

"It means," the ogre said, "you better keep your mouth shut or you'll be shitting out your nose. That's a promise, sweetheart."

"A-ok." Sam replied, clicking heels.

"Not a chirp," the man reiterated. " _Ever._ "

_Zoë_ , beyond repair and scavenged for parts, died an inglorious death. Sam shed more tears for her than when Pa kicked off. Relegated to busy work building mission profiles in strategic planning, he assumed the chances of spotting another flying saucer were the same as getting into the air again: _slim to none_. But in mid-April, the captain of the _Diddley Poo_ came down with measles and Sam weaseled into the vacant seat.

By then, the Luftwaffe had been reduced to squadrons of suicide pilots, the _Sonderkommando Elbe_ , and the occasional jet (with wings, a tail and engines). The jet Jerries even had a designation: _Messerschmitt Me262_. The Foo Fighters, flying saucers, whatever...Sam never saw another, and he never talked about his close shave. Snug in his brain the information sat, sandwiched between indisposition and self-loathing.

He kept the secret so well, he got a chance to blab about it to the Research Board in D.C. after the fun in Europe ended. He even met a few of the German engineers. All scientists looked the same to Sam: puffy, pale, humorless and four-eyed. The Nazis had the added pinched appearance of trepidation. Sam couldn't fathom their disquiet. The Kraut eggheads had it good in America...

***

The Germans, labeled on paper as _prisoners_ , were anything but...and even if they were, the U.S. government treated their treasured Nazis a smidge better than those snatched by the Soviets at the end of the war in "Operation Osoaviakhim".

"Operation Paperclip", the American version of Osoaviakhim, wangled skilled men like Wernher von Braun, Rudolf Schriever, Klaus Habermohl and Sighard Hoerner to the West with promises of amnesty and citizenship. Von Braun, known for his work on rocket propelled craft, helped create the American space program. The other three researchers made significant gains in the arena of supersonic flight.

In the early 40's, Schriever and Habermohl designed _Die Glocke_ , a rotating disk with turbine blades, at the behest of the German government. The Luftwaffe baptized the strange beast _Messerschmitt 310G_. Ten operational models of the M310G were put into service in mid-1943. Six crashed in the testing phase due to design flaws, and the Luftwaffe pilots referred to it (in secret, of course) as the _Tod Platte,_ or death disk. According to the pilots who lived to tell the tale of their wild rides, the death disk was: _the definition of a work in progress with no end_ ; _a nightmare to handle_ ; _uncontrollable except in perfect conditions_ ; _designed with non-existent trim capabilities._

The disk could hover, go vertical, and maintain straight-and-level flight. However, a single vibration caused _absolute_ instability and phugoid oscillations. Firing the cannons, for instance, became a figurative crap shoot. The undulations from the juddering recoil often sent the machine spinning into the ground.

Three of the vehicles engaged Allied airplanes on a handful of occasions, scoring a meager number of kills but scaring the poop out of enemy fliers. Two M310G's met destructive ends, leaving one airworthy when the Allies captured The Brocken. The tenth, and last contraption, assembled in Prague at the BMW Factory, fell into the hands of SMERSH agents. The Soviets also confiscated the design plans. By this time, though, the engineers responsible for the project had made their way to the United States.

Despite its flaws, _Die_ _Glocke_ presented as a technical marvel. It could climb to a service ceiling of 20,000 meters in less than ten minutes and achieve a top speed of 1,200 kilometers per hour at altitude. Dr. Hoerner, a specialist in aeronautical engineering, developed short takeoff and landing vehicles; his knowledge of aerodynamics improved the airframes of these sleek machines. Soon, the Americans had a facsimile of _Die_ _Glocke_. This successful replication, incorporated into the U.S. Army Air Force in early 1947, has remained a well-kept secret for over seventy years.

Likewise, the Soviets built their own shitty version thanks to the model pilfered from Prague but it -like the German prototype- suffered frequent mishaps. The _звонок_ never amounted to jack squat, and several dozen Russian pilots were smeared across the steppes trying to corral the creature. Stalin, after viewing the completed model in 1950, decided the aircraft wasn't worth the annoyance or the cost. The U.S. military, however, didn't have fiduciary constraints; Uncle Sam loved opening its purse for expensive trinkets like _Die_ _Glocke_.

It also helped there wasn't a shortage of pilots willing to risk their lives for its dear ole Uncle.

***

General Wallace Walsh, Sam's supervisor on the Research Board, slapped a black-and-white on his desk. Sam leaned forward, squinted, and then snorted. There it be: a flying saucer, the same thing he had seen over the Harz, rested on four stubby legs, each with a wheel, each wheel chocked. The craft, absent markings, appeared lusterless in the monochrome photo. A boil of clear filament rose from the middle of the saucer. In the foreground, two dour American staff sergeants posed next to the machine, the top of their helmets level with the middle of the slender fuselage.

"Look familiar, Captain?" Walsh asked.

"Yes, sir," Sam answered as he reclined in the seat.

"45th Infantry found it snug in the Harz a few weeks before the war ended."

"Am I to assume we're through pretending it doesn't exist?"

"For the sake of our discussion it exists. If anybody other than me asks, you pretend to be insulted by such a preposterous notion."

"Hmm...the damn thing looks smaller than I remember."

"Measures ten feet top to bottom with gear extended. Has a diameter of thirty feet, though you can't tell by this picture. I've a couple pics shot from above-"

"You can save your breath, sir. I've already seen it from below."

"Right. The Germans called it the Messerschmitt 310. They also named it _Die Glocke_. The Bell. Doesn't look like a bell to me."

"I see the resemblance."

"Maybe you can figure how to turn it on, because we can't get the fucking thing to work."

"What type of engine?"

"A jet engine. Three of 'em. One of 'em is teeny, though. The Germans call it...a...fuck, I can't remember. Something... _meinheit_. The interior of the fuselage is two spinning blades, and they work opposite each other. Thrust is expelled both laterally and horizontally. The fuel cell is tiny. I doubt The Bell has a long range although-"

"We haven't flown it?"

"Not yet. Truth is, we're afraid to try. It's the lone model we possess, which means a lot of important people would get mighty upset if someone turned The Bell into a heap of metal. The OSS managed to snag a few of the scientists who put this nifty thing together before the Ruskies got their hands on them, but design specs are missing. Putting another Bell together from scratch will take months, perhaps years. Then there's the matter of who gets a chance to fly the thing. The Luftwaffe pilots we've captured claim operational ignorance. However, they all know the name. It's something of a myth among those guys."

Sam maintained a poker face, but he felt a tingling in his stomach. When the time came to _fly the thing_ (and, perhaps, die in the thing but whatever), our pal figured he earned, at the least, a chance to put it through the wringer.

"As far as I know," Walsh said, "you and your copilot are the only men who can _verify_ this thing not only flew but had the capability to engage. Those others who saw it...well, they're either dead or aren't sure what they saw. We're going to tear it apart, piece-by-piece, and see what we can learn. Then, we're building our own model. When the time comes, would you like to try her out?"

"You've read my mind," Sam said, sitting taller in the chair.

"In the meantime, we're working with some of their other toys. The jet aircraft have great potential. High altitude stuff, the capability to fly above radar. How'd you like to do a tour over Russia someday?"

"Russia?"

"High altitude recon. Snapping pictures."

"Sounds interesting."

"All this is on the table."

"Thank you, sir."

General Walsh swept the photo into a file and then gazed at Sam. "So," he said, "now comes the unpleasant stuff. You have a reputation, the shit you pulled in California not-with-standing."

"Oh _that_ ," Sam said with wave of his hand. "We were just messin' around. Showin' our skills. I mean, look at ole Bing Bong."

"Major Bong is a Medal of Honor winner."

"Yes, sir, and where do you think he learned his moves? Besides, the DFC ain't nutin' to sneeze at."

"No, it isn't, and you earned it, Major. I've seen the pictures. Your bomber looked like swiss cheese. And you wouldn't be sitting in front of me if you exhibited subpar skills. But...um...while recommending you, General Doolittle harbors concerns about your fitness for duty. Some creative stories have made their way to me."

Sam flinched and then said, "I didn't realize the General thought so little of me. I never screwed around with the bombers. Them stories...you know how it is. Everybody blows steam, sir."

"Not like you. Listen, I _love_ guys with an edge. You have to be hard-boiled if you're going to strap a hunk of metal to your ass with no idea what it's capable of doing."

"I'm your guy then."

"Mm...if I didn't think so, you wouldn't be sitting in front of me. Captain, you're a cowboy. You like to have a good time. In D.C., this behavior _will_ be taken the wrong way. I don't have a problem with fun and games but...this work is classified. The Russians have agents crawling around, trying to pinch our secrets. You know why? They're too damn stupid to figure stuff on their own. We need to make sure our men aren't dripping good ink to the wrong ears."

"I understand."

"You have to be careful with the women, too. They aren't afraid to trade sex for secrets."

"Yes, sir."

"Just a fair warning to watch yourself, Pix. End of lecture. Any questions?"

"No, sir."

"Once this business with Japan is tied up, we'll get to work on the neat stuff."

Sam glanced at the calendar over Walsh's shoulder: _June, 1945_. Then he cleared his throat and said, "I have one question."

"What?"

"Well, sir, no offense, but some in my squadron are in the Pacific. I'd rather be there than sitting in an office."

"What'd I just tell you, son?"

"I get it, but I hate sitting around. Who knows how long it'll go on with the Nips."

"It's ugly out there. You thought the Nazis were bad? Those little yellow bastards put the Germans to shame. At least the Krauts honored the Geneva Convention when it came to our fliers."

"Yeah..." Sam hawed, scratching his head.

"You have a comment?"

"I don't mean to nitpick but-"

"There are exceptions to every rule," Walsh interrupted.

"Yes, sir."

"The goddamn Nips don't adhere to such mandates, nor do they _pretend_ to. They don't adhere to _nothing_. Never mind the shit they did to the Chinese. You think those German camps were bad? I bet the Nips triple the body count when the sum is totaled. Those fuckers all need to hang. I'll say this about the lot of them: they're a tenacious horde. Problem for those bastards is they've cooked a big pot of shit and it's about to boil over."

"Yes, sir, but my point is this thing could drag for a while."

Walsh winked and said, "No, it won't. I can't tell you what we got planned for the Nips, but it'll blow their socks off. So, get comfortable and start studying. We'll be busy in no time."

Walsh was spot on and Sam should've followed the advice. Who knew where'd he be today? But Sam, like his father, flew smack into a bad storm.

# 4. The Roswell Incident

_Humdinged_ , drunk, tastin' tumbleweeds, hairy tongued, spittin' rocks...pick the appellation and the cliché applied...groggy, Sam Pix stared at his face in the bathroom mirror.

He had his mother's nose, small and petite, and her hands, same description. His first girlfriend, Betty Lou Daugherty, loved his hands. She said they were cute, like him. Not big meat hands, rough from picking cotton or throwing wrenches, but tender and soft. On his fifteenth birthday, she let him feel her up in her room when they were supposed to be studyin' the Bible. Feel her up...and down...and she reciprocated. Betty Lou rubbed his pecker through his shabby jeans until the stupid thing made a mess in his shorts.

He didn't get no further with Betty Lou, though it wasn't because she locked the chastity belt and threw out the key. She presented in heat and he almost took the plunge, but Walt Pix's words about women and baby making echoed in his mind. And it was a good thing he didn't go swimming because Betty Lou caused quite the stir a year later when she got pregnant with Buck Powell's baby. _Only sixteen,_ Ma lamented. O'course, Ma wasn't much older than Betty Lou when she had Sam, but this be splittin' hairs. Regardless, Buck's night of passion could've been Sam's fate.

Dad's advice saved his bacon with Betty Lou, but the old man implied love, as a sentiment or bastion of happiness, be a prison used to enslave men.

One evening, not long after the lesson on thunderstorms, father and son were sitting on the porch...

"You're a good lookin' boy," Pa told him. "Chip off the block, if I do say so meself. But you best be careful with the girls," he warned, waggling a finger in Sam's face. "Don't do like I did and get trapped into something you can't back away from."

Sam winced. What the hell did he mean? _Trapped?_

"Das right, Sammy," the old man pontificated. "Women will _trap_ ya. They're like a spider. Weave a web around you until you can't move." He passed the jug of 'shine, watched Sam take a sip, and then continued: "You see why these people in Greenville got nothing? I mean, they poor because there ain't shit for jobs but they also poor cuz they got mouths to feed. Too many mouths. Instead of making a livin', these men think of nothin' but ruttin'. And the woman let 'em rub up in 'em. They feel like it's their duty to get rutted. These folks are nothin' but a collection of poor ole rutters."

"We ain't poor."

"No, we ain't, and you know why? Your old man learnt to fly and so will you. It's a trade. A _spesh-lized_ job. Most people are too stupid to do it. Or they afraid, Sammy. Afraid of the unknown. Afraid of dying. What's there to be scared of? You die once. Might as well kick off doin' somethin' exciting. Sitting around waiting to die is no way to live. You hear me, boy?"

"Ah...yes, sir," Sam answered, though trying to wrap his mind around the logic wasn't easy.

"In the meantime, flyin' is big money. I got on it as soon as I saw the potential. I'd be flyin' for Pan Am ifin I hadn't met your mother and..." He seized the jug from Sam's hands, took a nip and then sighed.

Our pal adjusted his rump, stared at his feet, and watched a twisty column of blank ants.

"Ayup," Pa said, "in this life you make it as far as your pecker lets you. Be smart with the damn thing."

Sam lathered the shaving cream onto his face...

Be smart with the damn thing.

Ha! Easier said than done. Walt Pix never met the blond wife of General Pederson. Vera was a flawless mishmash of sweet and naughty. He knew "fraternization" was a bad idea but so were a lot of other things. Because he was an idiot with zero self-esteem...well, he fell for her. Got trapped, like the old man said. What started as a lark become love and Sam got hooked. They met at some swanky D.C. restaurant during one of those officer galas. Sam had been goaded to attended by General Walsh so poohbahs like General Pederson could put a face to Sam Pix's name. Sam made the rounds, shook hands, and then settled at the bar with some of the other unattached officers. He caught her looking at him throughout the night and let imagination broadcast dirty thoughts through his sodden mind. She must've been thinking the same. And he knew...he _knew_ these fantasies were absurd. But then there she be, sidling next to him, smelling like roses.

"I'm ordering a drink for my husband," she whispered, "but I'm _really_ here because I want your name, handsome."

Slack jawed, Sam stared at her until she patted his hand and said, "Your name, handsome."

"Sam Pix," he garbled.

"Where do you work?"

He glanced at General Pederson and then said, "Research Board. The Pentagon."

"I'll call you," she said, patting his hand again. "I'm Vera, by the way, and I've been thinking about you _all_ night."

"So have I," he said, gazing into her green eyes.

"Good. Then we don't need to be coy, do we?"

Lickety-split it unfolded, this risky liason. First the lickity, then the split. Vera was good at both, the best lickity he ever met and the split...the doll enjoyed the split. In fact, Vera wanted Little Sam in orifices even Big Sam thought a mite blasphemous. But Vera didn't care and soon neither did Sam. They rumpy dumpied in his car, her car, in the Pentagon john, in parks and even in General Pederson's bed when the old man was away on business.

Sam knew he was playing with fire but, at first, he convinced himself Vera needed an outlet and he happened to be the lucky beneficiary. Mrs. Pederson was twenty years younger than her husband and, if she could be trusted (and it turned out she couldn't), the General's days of hanky panky were kaput. In a few weeks or months...whenever...they'd tire of each other and nobody would be none the wiser.

Like a fool, though, he developed an attachment to her. Yes, it went _way_ beyond the physical joys. A few buddies in the know told him to cut and run. _This won't turn out good,_ they warned. Sam thought different. Sam was wrong.

How she destroyed their relationship, and his career, with callous indifference...he felt wounded, like his heart had been stabbed and struggled to understand what he'd done to warrant her spite. At last, he realized Vera Pederson had a screw loose; she cherished attention and grabbed said attention no matter the cost. For instance, impressing the ladies at the bridge game with her adulterous antics. Sam had been another character in her crazy life drama.

Or, maybe, she'd been a character in his...

He began shaving the right side of his face, sliding the straight razor down the skin in smooth strokes. Someday he'd get over it. If he did and walked the straight line in Roswell (and walkin' straight was getting harder each day and impossible after seven in the evening), there was a chance he could resurrect his career. Then what? His file was marked with a scarlet letter. General Pederson had made it his mission to make Sam's life miserable. It'd never get better no matter what he did.

At first, Sam wanted to blame his father. Pa filled his head with the notion women weren't to be trusted. The single ones wanted to trap you into their web with baby makin'. Getting snagged meant your life was over. Sam listened to the old man and went for the cheap khaki-wacky floozies. The birds in England made it clear what they wanted, but some of 'em wanted more. Some of 'em wanted to trap a G.I. by getting _plenus_. _That_ wasn't happening to our pal, not on his watch. So, he bounced from the pretentious frilly-skirted broads to the ones wearing aprons and wedding rings. Why? Cuz they had already trapped a man. After Vera, he vowed to take a wide passage around them, too. Well clear. _All_ women, in fact. He'd tip-toe around them like they were surrounded by mines.

He worked the blade down his chin, grunting with satisfaction.

Of course, what happened when he arrived in New Mexico? He dove headfirst into another married skirt...

And, like the stoopid chump he was, he sorta fell for her.

Our stoopid pal sorta fell hard.

Face half-clean, and the other half covered in foam, he looked like a man with separate expressions. Sam imagined himself with a beard and a ranch in the New Mexico desert. He'd be accountable to nobody. Not women, not the military, nutin. He could live in the middle-of-nowhere, drink his whiskey at night and look into the universe. Shit, he could get into his car and leave now, disappear into thin air, disappear...south to Mexico, cross the border and...

And then what?

And then the fantasy ceased because the fantasy was stoopid. Changing scenery wouldn't change his brain. The last few months in Europe, his time in D.C., seven months, and counting, in Roswell...

He splashed water over the blade and stared into bloodshot eyes. "You're a stoopid motherfucker," he whispered to the reflection. "Stupid. Stupid. Stupid."

Would it _ever_ get better? Even if it did, what be the point? At one time he was certain he'd die in an airplane. If Ma's babble about predestination was true, God sent him to Roswell _for a reason_. It wasn't to die in an airplane, but the particulars weren't as important as the end result.

Our pal lifted the razor and watched light gleam off the blade edge.

Suicide...the _dirtiest_ word...crept into his intellect not long after arriving in New Mexico. Slouching at the bar, or sitting at his desk, or lying in bed...he tried to imagine _not existing._ At first, he pushed the dirty word aside like bad grub. He didn't like thinking about _it_ , but _it_ _wormed_ into his head, day after day, until...until he dwelled on _not existing_ almost all the time.

The guilt for even considering this line of thought bothered _almost_ as much as the idea. He'd seen countless people die during the war. Friends, strangers...good people meeting bad ends. Here he be, still kicking...feeling sorry for himself was like slapping them in the face. They'd give anything to be amongst the living; none of those fellas would've cared if they were platooned in Roswell, New Mexico.

"Stupid," he said.

_But how stupid is it?_ Brain needled.

Indeed...how stupid? No more _humdingers_ , no more listening to Morse code, no more Ted Williams, tumbleweeds, scorpions or Julie Brazel. All Sam had to do was make one adroit stroke. Cliff Potter slit his throat in the W.C. at Nuthampstead. Lieutenant Potter died fast, a blessed quickness compared to the suffering another few decades on this shitty planet would bring. Years of mornings like this, growing decrepit and breaking down one sorry limb and organ at-a-time until a man was back in diapers and babblin' like a baby. No thank you.

"Stupid," Sam repeated, shoving the dirty word from his head.

At some point, the word _stupid_ would disappear from his vocabulary. When this happened, the idea of suicide-

Banging, from the front of his house, five strident knocks at the door:

THUMP. THUMP. THUMP. THUMP. THUMP.

Then, a pause...

...and five more whacks...

THUMP. THUMP. THUMP. THUMP. THUMP...

Scowling, Sam placed the blade on the sink.

A second before chucking open the door, he wondered if Jules old man, _what's his name_ , had come to collect a pound of Sam Pix. So be it. His awful mood needed an outlet.

But when he flung open the door, Sam stared into the flinty faces of two military policemen and a Major in a wrinkled M1943 and field hat shoved to the brow ridge.

"Major Pix?" one of the MP's asked.

Sam nodded.

"We've been instructed to collect you, sir."

He thought he might've hit something on his drive from the Weed. It wouldn't have been the first time. Once, he sideswiped the guard booth at the base entrance. Another occasion, he ran over a dozen roadside reflectors and punctured a tire. Sam peered at his Cadillac Sixty Special in the driveway. Faint light, distorted and gray...but his car looked undamaged.

"We've been trying to call," the Major said in a twangy voice. He appeared to be around Sam's age and had a flaking, sunburned face. "Your phone is busy."

"I take it off the hook," Sam explained. "I figure anyone calling me in the middle-of-night has bad news. I'd rather hear it in the morning."

The Major smiled and Sam noticed his teeth were screwy. A couple missing, a few crooked. The grin of poverty. "I'm Major Jesse Marcel of the 509th Operations Group," he said, removing the kepi and revealing the SI military cut. "This is for ears only, Major Pix."

"In the flesh."

"I need to see your CAC."

Sam stood aside and motioned the three inside. Then he rummaged through his pants (lying on his kitchen floor), found his wallet and produced the card. Marcel and the MP's studied the photograph and then looked at Sam.

"Satisfied?" Sam asked.

"Service number?" Marcel asked.

Sam recited it and the Major returned the identification.

"Finish up, get dressed, wear something comfortable," Marcel instructed. "Combat service boots, if you have them. I don't care if you don civvies, but you'll be speaking to the old man later and-"

"The old man?"

"Base commander, Colonel Blanchard."

Sam crossed his arms and asked, "What's going on?"

"This is a Mogul S & R," Marcel said.

"Mogul?"

"You're involved with Mogul, aren't you?"

"Involved? I mean..." Sam chuckled and shrugged.

"What?"

"Fella, I listen to Morse code for eight hours a day. You wanna say I'm involved, then I'm involved."

"But you've launched and recovered balloons?"

"Yeah, I've _helped_."

"Could you identify one if you saw it lying on the ground?"

"Did we lose one? I know they leak and whatnot."

"A rancher found one about thirty clicks north of here, in the desert. I was there yesterday but can't make heads nor tails of it."

"You ought to contact Doctor Peoples or Doctor Crary. Them two are the brains behind Mogul. I'm a peon."

"The doctors are in Alamogordo."

Sam scratched his head. He forgot the civilians were doing a demonstration for college eggheads from the East Coast.

"Come on, Major," Marcel said, snapping fingers. "We're wasting time."

"Hold a sec," Sam said, shifting tactics. The last thing he wanted to do was hoss his hungover ass around the desert. "How do you know it's Mogul's trash. We haven't launched a balloon in-"

"Do you want to tell Colonel Blanchard you're refusing an order?" Marcel asked. "Or should I inform him you're unfit for duty."

"Jesus," Sam mumbled. "Did you try Captain Trakowsi?"

"Trakowsi's in Alamogordo with the project heads. You're next man up."

Sam rubbed his face and forgot about the shaving cream. He looked at his hand, shook his head and then said, "Shit. Have a seat. Give me ten."

"I'll give you five," Marcel said, as he sat down on the sofa. "I want to be walking the crash site at sunrise."

# 5. Foster's Ranch

They drove north from the airfield in a pea-green Military Police Plymouth, through sleepy Roswell, and joined US 285. The deserted two-lane blacktop allowed the driver to mash the go pedal, and the car accelerated until it rattled like the Rapture. The sun poked through holes in the stratus clouds and crepuscular rays cut alternating swaths of light-and-dark across the sky. Marcel sat in the back of the vehicle with Sam. Nobody talked, which was hunky-dory, and Sam watched the scrub flash past his dirty window.

Sam pondered a host of irritating thoughts. There had to be somebody more qualified than him who could identify a crashed balloon. His headache bloomed as the full radiance of the sun emerged, striking him in the eyes.

_Or shithead_ , Brain lectured, _this is what the least qualified get to do._ _You, Sammy, are a glorified garbage collector, he-he._

Marcel nudged him in the ribs and held out a pack of smokes. Sam shook his head.

"Don't smoke, eh?" Marcel asked after lighting up and shaking out the match.

"Naw."

"Not even when you're drinking?"

Sam squinted at Marcel and said, "Yeah, even when I'm drinking."

"I can smell it comin' out of you, Major."

"Aftershave."

"Uh-huh."

"Listen, pal, there ain't nothing to do _but_ booze. You try listening to dots-and-dashes without needing something to numb it at the end of the day."

"I hear ya. More than half our squad are deployed at Kwajalein and I'm stuck minding the house because I didn't pass my physical."

"Where?"

"Kwajalein. It's an atoll in the Marshall's."

Sam blinked.

"Marshall Islands?" Marcel asked. "Ring a bell?"

"Yeah, yeah, I've heard of 'em. I flew in Europe. Never sniffed the Pacific."

Marcel took a puff and then said, "Be thankful. Rotten world. Humid. Buggy. I flew B-29's. You catch lead over Europe, you got land to set feet on. Our choices were the ocean or the yellas. Easy decision if you ask me. I'd take my chances in the ocean over Jap internment."

"The Nazis weren't throwin' a big gala for us."

Marcel chuckled and then said, "I'm not getting into a pissing contest about which of 'em was fouler."

"Hey, you brought it up."

"Eh, let's agree the good guys won."

"Fair enough."

"So... _ahem_...this here thing we're heading to? What else you guys testing besides sound waves?"

"What else?"

"Ya'll sending dummies up?"

"Dummies?"

"Mannequins?"

"What are you talkin' about?"

"I see how it is. Tough Shit? Need to know basis? I gotta get a handle on this because I have a rancher and a sheriff talking like they found a flying disk with little spacemen inside."

"Flying disk?" Sam squawked.

"I was out there yesterday at dusk with one of the guys who found it. He claims to have wandered on it last week. He's a rancher and-"

"Hold on, chief," Sam interrupted. He wasn't clicking on all four, but the conversation with Jules a few nights ago fired in his head. "What's the name of the rancher?"

"Um..." Marcel shoved the heater between lips and pulled a pocket notebook from his field jacket. Then he flipped open the notebook and read: "Brazel. Bravo-Romeo-Alpha-Zulu-Echo-Lima."

" _What's his name,"_ Sam muttered.

Marcel mistook the aggravated statement as question and repeated, "Brazel. Surname. First name of William. He's a foreman on this Foster Ranch. Our destination. And let me tell you, William Brazel isn't looking hot. I don't know if he's uneasy or what, but the entire time he's sweating and shaking. So...by his story, I guess he finds the mess but doesn't call the Sheriff..." Marcel peeked at his notes and then continued, "...Wilcox until yesterday morning. The Sheriff, in turn, calls the Air Field. I trudge out yesterday afternoon with these two and lo-and-behold, thar she blows. Foil, rope, bamboo, parchment, and this rubbery stuff I'm assuming is the balloon. With me?"

"I follow."

"Straight forward, right? I'm thinking search, recovery and back to the Officers Club by six for a beer. Except this Brazel fella says there's more. And he leads me another, oh, few miles along a gulch. Some cattle are grazing around this...I don't know what to call it. I'd say it's a big strongbox but...it looks like a cockpit."

"A cockpit?"

"Hold on. This...I'm gonna call it a cockpit, okay? The cockpit is six, almost seven feet ground to top, and six feet wide. Tiny. Windscreen facing east, little door facing sundown. Right? This hatch is big enough for a man to crawl into and it's closed. Brazel says he opened it a few days earlier but only managed to crack it a smidge. After some back-and-forth, we trudge to my jeep and get a crowbar. I'm sort of curious, you know? Wilcox is spent, doesn't want to walk back, but Brazel's inclined so off we go. I manage to fit the bar into the seam, strain a bit and pry the door 'bout four inches. I can fit my fingers into it but it won't budge another inch. Follow?"

Sam pictured the scene and nodded.

"The hatch is stuck fast, corroded. I peered in, stuck my eye to the crack with the torch, but I couldn't see squat. Foul smell from the inside. Wretched. Caught a whiff of it and almost tossed my lunch. Brazel says he got the same reception, so I pushed the hatch shut and walked to the front to have a look at the window. The windscreen is spider-webbed and dirty. I tried to look inside but with the sun going down I couldn't see much. I lit it up with a torch and..." Marcel took another drag and then said, "...three dummies inside. Brown and shriveled, like they've been in the sun too long. Whatcha call 'em? Mannequins? I don't know the scientific word-"

"Maybe you were in the sun too long."

"I _know_ what I saw. They looked like raisins, and they had oxygen masks on."

"O2 masks?"

"Yep. Coats, gloves...one with headgear-"

"Headgear?"

"Pilot helmet, like an old leather jobber. No googles, though. Someone dressed these things to look the part, but the clothes are shabby. Guess you wouldn't put new threads on a test dummy, right?"

"I wouldn't know."

"Makes sense to me and so...I decided I'm done poking around. Except, of course, one of my tires is punctured. Nasty thorn or barb about four inches long, I kid you not. Two of 'em, matter of fact. By the time I get the tire changed, haul ass to base...it's dark. I contacted the Colonel -he's half in the bag and annoyed- but he called a few of your comrades in Mogul. A warrant officer and an NCO-"

"Paper pushers, Major."

"Figures, because nobody knows shit from Shinola. The two civilians, Doctors Jekyll and Hyde, are in Alamogordo and you weren't answering your phone. Anyway...I didn't move them dummies because I thought you guys might need to study them. Or something."

"I don't know about experiments with dummies."

"Somebody has to."

"Well, it's above my pay grade."

"Hmm," Marcel mused. "Whatever it is, you get the honors of securing the scene."

***

The Plymouth passed a listing mailbox (stenciled on the rusty tin in white chalk: _FOSTER_ ) on the right shoulder, swung a wide left, and then merged onto a gravel road.

_Dummies,_ Sam thought.

Maybe the Doctors initiated a new experiment and hadn't bothered to share details with anyone from Mogul. Flying dummies into the stratosphere, gaging radiation or...or cosmic rays. Doctor Crary's pet project measured ultraviolet radiation. Why not?

Sure...but why hadn't Sam heard anything about it? If not Sam, then somebody in Mogul would know _something_. The balloons and their equipment were tracked, monitored...and it went beyond anal-retentive record keeping. Every last motherhumping detail found its way into a book, chart or on a chalkboard.

Nothing in Mogul vanished. It might get...eh... _misplaced_ for a stretch, but the equipment cost big bucks. Shit worth big bucks _never_ disappeared into thin air.

Something else it could be: a weather balloon. Perhaps...launched from another base...but the WX swells had kites and parachutes and _small_ modules tethered to the cables, not "cockpits"...or...whatever. And no dummies.

The dummy part didn't make any sense and Jules hadn't mentioned this tidbit the last time he saw her. If she had, he might've been more diligent and...come to think of it, she hadn't been at the Weed since her "Dear John" speech. Instead, Fred's shrewish wife worked the tables.

Marcel elbowed him in the stomach and said, "Brazel's going to meet us at the rancher's house. He knows this area better than his old lady's backside."

And then there's that.

When he arrived in January and took his first sober step into the Tumbleweed, they locked eyes and he sensed the immediate surge of interest. Sam knew the look, God did he ever, and she'd been receptive to flirtation. He recognized in her the same loneliness what drove Ma into the arms of a man like Preacher Post. Bedding Jules, making herself shriek in pleasure, made our pal feel good. And the way she looked at him felt better; it made him feel _wanted_. But, while both of 'em found succor, only one of 'em experienced satisfaction. Goddamn, what a stoopid chump Sam turned out to be.

"Stoopid," Sam hacked.

"Huh?" Marcel asked.

"I'm... _ahem_...forget it."

"Homesteads coming up," said Marcel, pointing right. "Foster's place."

_Foster's place_ : a sprawling single-story house, white stucco turned brown, surrounded by a wooden picket fence. Three panting German Shepherds roamed the dusty side yard. A couple of pickup trucks, both covered in russet grime, parked in front.

The Plymouth stopped with a jerk and the driver killed the engine. Then he swung his head around and asked, "You want us to join you, sir?"

"Naw," Marcel answered, as he opened his door. "Sit tight. We'll be but a couple minutes." He slid off the seat, stepped out...and, after an aggrieved sigh, Sam did the same.

They waited, while the car engine ticked like a bomb, shoulder-to-shoulder until the front door of the Foster's home opened. Three people emerged, in order of height: William Brazel (or _what's his name_...or "Mac", for whatever reason), an old man Sam didn't recognize and, of course, Jules.

"Let's get rolling!" Marcel hailed. "Daylight's wasting."

Wheezing, Mac ambled forward, bent over at the waist. Marcel's description be spot-on: Brazel _didn't look good_. The actual factual: Mac appeared...injured...or sumptin...and he grimaced with each step. The other fella shadowed Mac, a bit spryer despite his age, wearing a pronounced scowl on his sunburned face. Jules remained stationary, looking at Sam with squinty eyes. She didn't appear surprised to see him.

"I feel...like...God took...a shit on...me," Mac pronounced in a phlegmy, husky voice. "I can't...shake...this...cold."

"Who's the woman?" Marcel asked.

"My...wife...Julie," panted Brazel. "She drove...me here but...she won't...get in the...way."

"Major Pix, this is William Brazel and J.B. Foster."

"Call me...Mac," Brazel said. "I'd...shake...your hand...but...I might...be...contagious."

Sam touched the bill of his kepi but avoided _prolonged_ eye contact. He'd never seen _what's-his-name_ in the flesh and...let's just say: Sam _wasn't_ impressed. Brazel's dark-skinned speckled with age spots and his eyes were red and watery.

Marcel gave Mac the thrice over and then said: "Mister Brazel, if you're not well enough to-"

"Mac's fine," J.B. Foster snapped. "Can we get a move on, mister? I've a hundred head to move and a bunch of government shit spoiling my land."

"Works for me," Marcel said, snapping his fingers. "You lead, we'll follow. The woman stays. I don't want additional contamination of the site."

# 6. The Two Sites

They followed Foster's green Chevy JC Master as the road turned into two shallow ruts. After a mile, the ruts became desert and then they were off road, squashing shriveled shrubs and ensconced in a cloud of dust.

Marcel shook out another cigarette and said: "Believe you me, this ain't the first time I've played fetch. Alamogordo's been sending up weather balloons for a year, give or take, and these ranchers find them where they fall."

"Uh-huh," Sam peeped. "See, I was thinking...maybe _hoping_...it's theirs."

"I've never seen a weather balloon like this one. Regardless, it's not Alamogordo's. I got someone on the blower last night and they don't want nothing to do with our junk pile."

"Passing the buck?"

"They'd fess. Besides, most of their kits splash down in White Sands altho...I had one land near Artesia in June. Got loose from its mooring cable, I guess."

Sam counted a dozen head of cattle milling in the brush, lethargic tails flapping, ears pinned; another panting dozen lazed on the dry shingle.

"It supposed to rain?" our pal asked.

"Rain?" Marcel scoffed. "Naw, Major, it ain't supposed to rain."

"My pa always told me downers meant rain was coming."

"I don't know a thing about cows," Marcel mumbled as he torched the heater. "But it's hot as blue blazes. They're prolly fixing to drop dead."

They travelled an imperceptible distance in the jostling, smoky sweatbox until Sam thought he was going to yak. He tried to focus on a stationary object outside and settled on the distant, jagged Sacramento Mountains.

But cuz he couldn't help hisself, every couple seconds Sammy's eyes crept to the right and beheld a view what never altered: be miles of desert distorted by shimmering thermals.

Lickety split, he'd feel sick again.

The Chevy slowed, flashed brake lights and then skidded to a stop; the Plymouth followed suit.

"Time to get to work," Marcel said with zero enthusiasm.

***

J.B. Foster -pugnacious with a bald dome and piggish nose- pointed at the mess of debris and then spat:

"I want this shit cleaned up! My cattle can't be nibbling on rebar and...and God knows what else!"

Our pal Sammy ignored the old man; instead, he tread into the edge of the debris field and whet lips.

A concentrated grouping of foil, rods, and what looked like a large, deflated balloon, blanketed the ground; a portion of canvas appeared lumpy, like it had folded over itself. Tho determining an exact bladder size be an impossibility without a yardstick or ten, Sam guesstimated _at least_ twenty feet of canvas stretched in front of him.

"There's no call for truculence, Mister Foster," Marcel soothed. "Your Uncle's been square with you. God's honest, we'll have this cleared by the weekend and-"

" _Weekend_?" Foster yipped. " _Weekend_!"

"Uncle Sammy is the business of compensating for your livestock _if_ it comes to that...which I'm sure it won't."

Foster huffed, crossed arms and then said, "What about Mac? He ain't been feeling pleasant since he happened on... _whatever_ it is. Ya'll testing something?"

Marcel deferred to Sam with a sideways glance.

" _Ahem_...we're not testing anything," Sam said. "We're listening to sound waves."

"Sound waves?" Foster asked. "What the hell for?"

Sam shrugged and said, "Beats me, old timer."

"Uh-huh. Military stuff," Foster rumbled.

"The second site is north," Marcel told Sam. "A bit of a walk. We could try to drive, but the ground is thick with cactus and tumbleweeds. The damn thing couldn't have picked a worse place to come down. We'll need a deuce to get it out."

Sam approached a triangular piece of silver foil and prodded it with his left boot. Then he bent over and picked-up a rod, three inches in length. Flaking rust decorated his hand and flittered to the ground. "When was the last rain?" he asked, studying the shavings on his palm.

"It's been a dry summer, mister," Foster bitched. "Last measurable precip fell three weeks ago as of yesterday."

Sam tossed the rod, walked to the canvas, and squatted. It took him all of a hot second to deduce the balloon wasn't rubber...or any type of polyethylene plastic he'd seen before. For good measure, he brushed sand from the surface and then ran his soiled hand over the canvas. Rough texture, almost like sandpaper. Marcel hovered behind, and then moved aside when Sam stood.

"Well, I'm stumped," Sam pronounced, as he brushed both hands against his jacket. "But I can tell you one thing: this ain't from Mogul."

"Are you sure? Maybe they sent one up when you were knocking off early to visit the watering hole."

"Pal, I'm a peon on the naughty list," Sam said through a compressed mouthline. "I don't have operational knowledge of _anything_. And like I also said, I'm not the one who should be out here. Let's call it a day before we get heatstroke."

"What about serial numbers?"

Sam spread his arms, raised eyebrows and said, "Behold this field of junk. We're going to have to pick-up _everything_ and have a look. Judging by the state of these scraps, I'd say it's been resting here a while."

"How long?"

"Long enough to oxidize. And this canvas is covered in a layer of dust."

"A few weeks?"

"Try again."

"A month?"

"Someone in Mogul would've noticed an AWOL balloon long before a month passed. The...whatchacallit...them modules, okay? They have Parrot transponders and-"

"Everyone of 'em has a transponder?"

"No, but...jeez, Major, does any of this look fresh from the factory? Lookit this canvas, how it's faded and sun bleached? I'd say...maybe _several_ months. Or...a year...two years...twenty...who knows?"

Marcel scoffed and then said, "No way."

"Why not?"

"You've never seen this?" Marcel asked Foster. "How long have you run cattle on this land?"

"Longer than you've been in the Army, mister," answered Foster. "And the last time I let the herd graze past the Clip...hell...it musta been five years ago. I don't come back this way unless I have to."

"The Clip?"

"Clipper arroyo," Foster spat, yanking a thumb over his hunched shoulders. "Bendy wash miles back. Feeds off the Pecos."

"This balloon isn't composed of material we use," added Sam.

"What do you mean?" Marcel asked.

"I can tell you it's not rubber _or_ polyethylene, for one. Second, it's layered in squares and the squares are...they're glued together or sumptin. The Mogul balloons are one solid piece, uniform in structure. See," Sam said, dropping to a knee and jabbing a finger onto the canvas, "this thing is too...um..." He paused, squinted and then rubbed dirt away. Something caught his peepers...faint graffiti, scratched on the surface...letters and a number: _D.P. 1945_. Underneath, in small ragged script: _Dale Palmer._

"Huh," Sam grunted, pointing at the scratches. "Check it out."

Hands on knees, Marcel leaned over, mumbled something, then straightened. "At last," he said, sounding relieved. "I told you we'd find something."

"Do tell."

"It's a...a year, right? And a name. Dale Palmer. He an engineer or a scientist?"

Sam stood, felt his knees pop, and said, "Nobody I've heard of."

Foster interjected with a curt: "You folks don't know where this piece of shit came from?"

"No," Sam said.

"We're not sure," countered Marcel.

Brazel sauntered towards them and wheezed, "What...about them...three...creatures?"

"We've already been through this," Marcel said. "They're dummies."

"I...know what...you told...me," Brazel argued, "and I...heard what Major...Pix...said. How do...you know what...it...is or...isn't?"

"What it could be," Sam said, trying to sound authoritative, "is something left over from the war. They tested the atom bomb near Socorro. This might be the remnants of an ordinance test."

"No, sir," Foster said, jutting chin. "I've owned this land for ten years. Private land. 650 acres. No testing, not once."

Sam didn't feel like arguing with him. If the military wanted to test something they sure as shit would, with or without this grumpy codger's permission.

"Let's go check out the creatures," Sam said.

"Mannequins," Marcel corrected.

***

Sam flinched, glanced at Marcel, and then peered into the window again, holding the flashlight against the glass. The three of them, dummies or _whatnots_ , were strapped into seats, clear masks around their mouths...or mouth holes...or... _whatnots_. They didn't look like any _mannequins_ Sam had seen but, to be fair, he'd never seen a _test dummy_. No, they bore a similarity to mummies...but he hadn't ever seen a mummy, either...except once, in high school, but it had been a picture of King Tut. Our pal also saw King Tut's pecker, or part of it...which happened to be the only thing he remembered about King Tut, ancient Egypt, or mummies.

_Creatures._ Brazel called these things _creatures_. And you know, with the flashlight angled just so...they looked like _creatures_. _Dead_ creatures, but creatures all the same.

But Sam had also never seen a dead body so...what did he know? He'd seen plenty of dead people in pictures: the Jews from the German death camps received a lot of exposure and lurid images were passed around the barracks, instigating passion from the fliers. _This is why we're bombing these dirty Hun bastards,_ General Doolittle boomed, as he held the stills in his trembling hands. Bodies stacked like wood...little bodies, big bodies, naked bodies, old bodies, baby bodies...so many bodies, Sam wanted to yak.

The _creatures_ stuffed into the cockpit (it wasn't a cockpit, per se...but a discussion on what it was or wasn't could wait until later) sorta resembled bodies from a concentration camp: emaciated and grotesque. But they were russet and wrinkled, like leather. No eyes in the sockets, no hair on the head, no skin as far as Sam could see with the dim glow of the flashlight...what the hell? Like Marcel said, one of 'em had headgear...the _creature_ in the middle...a pilot's leather helmet; all of 'em wore swollen threadbare coats disintegrating at the elbows, sleeves and shoulders. Underneath the coats...perhaps jumpsuits. Regardless, the bodies looked shrunken, like the outfits were a few sizes too large.

He clicked off the torch and tossed it to the MP.

"Wha...well?" Brazel asked. The man, and his faltering, panting dialect, was starting to annoy. Sick or not, Sam wondered what Jules found attractive about him. He hovered behind Sam the entire hike from the first site, directing the men where to go, pestering and prodding with inane theories. Then he started blabbing about flying disks, which perked Sam's ears, but claimed they were full of spacemen from other planets.

" _Well_ what?" Sam responded. "What do you want me to say? Beats me."

"So...it could be...a flying...disk? Men...from...space?"

Sam laughed and shook his head.

"How do you...know? Why don't...we force...open this...thing...and pull...them out?"

"Does this look like a flying disk?" Sam asked. "Nothing disky about it. Flyin' box more like."

"Nobody's opening anything," Marcel pronounced.

"Spaceman, real men, I don't care. I want the damn thing off my land," Foster grumbled.

"And we'll scoop it up, okay?" Marcel said. "You need to exercise patience and let us do our job."

"Patience, you say?" crowed Foster. "Listen, mister, I've been more than patient! Why, I've half a mind to call the newspaper and tell them..."

While the two argued, Sam walked around the ship and let his fingers trace the edges. Warm to the touch and smooth like metal. The lack of insignia or markings vexed. The Army stamped something on their objects, be it an airplane or a spoon: _Property of USA_. Sam had a thought it could've come from the Nevada test site, where Benny Green flew top secret airplanes, but dismissed it in short order. Or...maybe it was a Navy vehicle...but...if the Navy lost a craft, they'd sure as shit be looking for it. And it wouldn't be a half-assed effort like this one.

He meandered around the back and found the hatch Marcel described: a square door about two feet in length and width. Hinges indicated it opened out but, absent a handle or lever, it appeared impossible to open from the outside. But since the door wasn't flush, reason dictated it could be forced open. Sam wiped hands on his pants, then threaded fingers into the narrow opening. He gave it a pull and it moved, with a whiny squeal, no more than an inch before stopping. After several more futile tugs, he stuck his right eye to the sliver of gap and tried to peer inside. Hopeless...he couldn't see a thing. However, the smell...Gawd-awful. Sam coughed and stepped away.

At the air base they'd get a winch, jam a crowbar in there, and pry the hatch free. Or crack the windscreen. Perhaps cut a hole through the exterior with a torch if nothing else worked.

Well...what began as an annoying trek had turned into something a little more exciting. The craft, the balloon, _Dale Palmer_...the creatures...all of it a mystery requiring an answer. And there would be an answer. Sam wasn't sure what it be...but he began to lean towards an exercise done during the war. Maybe an atom bomb blew this device sky high and it floated, and then crashed, here on J.B. Foster's shitty grit.

Speaking of which...Marcel and the old man continued to jaw. Brazel had taken a seat on the ground and rested his head in hands. One of the MP's stared at the sun...or sumptin. The other policeman, a sergeant with the large flashlight tucked under the right armpit, dug a hand into a pouch of snuff.

"Get a pinch?" Sam asked.

The sergeant folded the pouch and tossed it underhand, but the lousy throw landed to Sam's left, next to the rear of the craft.

"Sorry, sir," the MP said. "I'll get it."

"Don't worry about it," Sam answered, as he bent to retrieve the tobacco. As he scooped the pouch, a new surprise greeted his eyes. A small appendage jutted into sand...a tube...or shaft. Brushing dirt aside, then scooping, he found what looked to be half a propeller, ten inches long, and the protrusions for two others busted at the base. Only nubs remained, but Sam ran a finger over them, felt what appeared to wood...

"Give me the light," Sam demanded, snapping fingers at the sergeant.

"Sir?"

"Your torch. Give it to me!"

"Ah...sir, the snuff is next to-"

Sam sprang to feet, yanked the flashlight from the sergeant's pit, and strode to the front of the cockpit. Yes, there be no doubt in Sam Pix's head...

Foster continued woofing, but Marcel (rubbing chin and tapping a foot) twisted his head. Frowned. Watched Major Pix...

"...would happen if I lost my cattle?" Foster screeched. "Tarnation! I assure you, mister..."

...turn his kepi around, peek into the cockpit, crane his neck, adjust posture...

"...what kinda of thing would I have to show-"

Marcel raised his left hand, stuck the palm in front of Foster fat mouth, and asked, "See something, Major?"

Contorted, left cheek flush with the window, sweat dribbling from underneath the field hat, Sam handed the torch to the MP and rasped, "Put it against the glass. Tilt it so the beam points down."

The sergeant took the light, cozied next to Sam...

"Over," Sam directed. "Left. Not against the glass. Back...okay...hold it steady..."

There it be, aglow in the cone of light: a glove clasped around a control yoke.

"Little more left," Sam instructed. A second later, the reflection of something in the hand of the figure in the right seat. Groaning, Sam tried to force his eyes through the windscreen. His breath fogged glass; the awkward position hurt his back. It looked like a map...a frayed map speckled with strange script...but he couldn't be certain. Legs trembling, he pushed from the vehicle and rested elbows on knees.

"What is it?" Marcel asked.

Sam waved his hand with indifference and said, "Yep, mannequins. I saw the stamp on one of their jumpsuits." Then he cleared his throat and presented Marcel with _the_ hairy eyebrow.

"Good," Foster said. "Now you can get this off my land."

"Yes, sir," Marcel said. "We're...ah...we're going to...um-"

"We're returning to Roswell," Sam finished, before turning and walking away.

"And then what?" Foster called, putting hands on hips.

Major Marcel had a few questions of his own, but none of them would be answered here.

"And then what?" J.B. Foster repeated, elbowing Marcel in the stomach.

"We're going back to the base, and then we're going to bring a couple trucks," Marcel said.

"How many?"

"Two...three...I don't know, sir."

"Big ones?"

"A couple of deuces."

"You're going to frighten my cattle!"

"Do you want it cleared or not? We can't snap our fingers and make everything disappear."

This conversation became more irritating background noise as Sam attempted to put thoughts in order. He wasn't certain of anything, and jumping to conclusions be pointless without facts, but one thing be positive: he passed the hangover phase of the day with nary a whimper. The sight in the cockpit had sobered him.

# 7. Press Release

Colonel William Blanchard, commanding officer of Roswell Army Air Field, grimaced as he sipped from a mug of coffee, the emblem of the 509th painted on the side of his cup: set inside a yellow shield, two blue-bird wings framed the mushroom cloud of an A-bomb. The 509th had heralded the atomic age of warfare by dropping the "Little One", so named, on Hiroshima. Blanchard...well, he _wanted_ the job of incinerating the Jap bastards, and he wanted it _Bad_. But this honor went to Paul Tibbets and his crew of the _Enola Gay_.

He'd been disappointed, but Tibbets outranked and seniority trumped. So be it. After the war, after Tibbets became a hero (not like Paul hadn't earned the honor, of course) and climbed into a catbird seat at the Pentagon, Blanchard was handed the keys to the 509th...to assist in its demobilization. At present, little remained of the wing. They'd been sent to drill in the Ralik Chain, but Blanchard remained behind in Roswell to twiddle thumbs and chew on the notion he'd been sent to pasture...like somebody upstairs decided Colonel William Blanchard manned a desk better than he...

_Ahem_...needless to say, he felt snubbed. And, though the circumstances were different than what landed Sam Pix in Roswell, Colonel Blanchard worried his career had come to die in New Mexico. His wife, Anne (bless her heart), tried to sooth trepidation with romantic bullshit and...well, all kinds of nonsense. _You should be glad for the time at home_ , she prattled...forgetting Roswell _wasn't_ home. Roswell was a _dung heap._ Anne also worried her husband would give himself a stroke when he lapsed into one of his "moods". Indeed, in the not so distant future, William Blanchard would suffer a massive heart attack at the age of 50. _DOA._

Until then, he had a kingdom to lord over...diminutive as it be. William Blanchard once organized bombing raids on Japan; Roswell and its bullshit balloon experiments equaled women's work. His command ran with nary a hitch and this suited Colonel Blanchard just fine. Yet, _somehow_...these two knuckleheads in front of him, yapping about shit in the desert? This business _should've_ been handled with _nary a hitch_. Lo and behold, these fatheads appeared hellbent on unarying the hitch and _fucking up_ his command!

"Let me get this straight," Blanchard said, setting down the mug. He liked his coffee hot, even in the heat of summer, and steam wafted in front of his eyes. Blanchard also enjoyed a daily round of afternoon golf (when the sun be at its hottest), and his face looked like a ripe tomato. One thing he did not like: Incompetence! _Incompetence_ infuriated Colonel Blanchard. Incompetence got people killed. Welp, he be ass deep in a swamp of _Incompetence_. "You two don't think it's one of Mogul's balloons? Christ Almighty! How difficult can this be?" Meanwhile, a fly orbited his head and then landed on the buzzcut gray hair, but Blanchard didn't notice or care.

Our pal, damp field hat in left hand, maintained eye contact with the Colonel. It was important to keep bearing when getting ass chewed. He should know; it wasn't the first time he'd been on the bad end of an officer's tantrum. As he eyeballed the Colonel, he recalled an incident from childhood: Age ten...maybe eleven...but his age didn't matter...he'd been sauntering home from school when a stray dog approached. And it had been one ugly mutt. Matted pelt, missing fur, ears pinned...the beast arched hackles, bared teeth and slung saliva from its frothy muzzle. Sammy's heart raced as the dog rumbled, spit, and approached at a meandering pace. According to Walt Pix, Mississippi strays loved making meals out of little boys and girls. And Dad said them strays had the _ray-bees_ , a bad thing to get 'cause your brain gets _dee-hi-dray-it_. When confronted by a _rabbit_ dog, Dad said, the _only_ thing a little fella could do be to stare the dog down. _Show 'em who the boss is._ Thus, Sammy stared the dog down, stared it down even as his legs shook and his pee-pee shrank. He stared hard, with squinty eyes, to show the mutt Sammy Pix meant business...and, like magic, he stared the bastard in the opposite direction. Stared it away like his mind had a witch power. Elated, he ran home and told Daddy what he'd done. Walt, well-oiled on the porch, slapped Sam's keyster and said _'Good job, Sammy. You got to stare 'em down. Stare 'em down until they blink.'_

Blanchard looked like he had the _ray-bees_ and Sam wasn't gonna drop his stare. No, sir. Besides, he'd done as instructed. The Colonel didn't like the news? Tough shit, sweetheart.

"Sir," Sam said, "I don't know how much clearer I can be. You oughta get Peoples or Crary to take a look-"

"Fuck those two fuddy-duddies'," Blanchard snapped. "Do you think I want civilians doing a job you're _hypothetically_ trained to handle? Anyway, they're busy building Frankenstein or some damn monster. They don't return from Alamogordo until Friday."

"I suggest you get them in the loop."

"You _suggest_? I can do better than _suggest,_ Major. Get out of my office, you and you, and take care of your balloon!"

Sam sighed and shook his head. Blanchard was the typical hard-headed senior officer he'd come to despise, men so stubborn they'd kill an entire group of boys to make a point.

"What?" the Colonel growled. "You got something smart to add, Major Pix?"

"I'm telling you this is _nutin_ I've seen before. Those things in the cockpit...I think they're people. They had-"

"Maps in a contraption they could fly? Attached to a balloon? Jiminy, what sense does this make?"

"I agree, it makes zero sense. But I know what I saw. We should call the test range in Nevada, see if they've lost a crew. Although, judging by those men, they'd have been missing a while. They look mummified."

"If I ring Indian Springs," Blanchard said, "they're gonna laugh at me. And _then_ they'll call a shrink and have us evaluated. Guess what's next?"

"What's next is somebody smarter than me needs to have a look at what's sitting thirty odd clicks north of here."

"Sir, we returned with a few pieces foil and bamboo," Marcel said, stepping forward. "It's in a storage shed near the Mogul HQ. Then there's the matter of this Foster character. He's raising hell about us getting this shit off his land."

Blanchard's throat made a gurgling sound and then he roared, "Fuck him, too! I'll show him what he can do with his fucking land! Let's load up a deuce with men and start traipsing through the desert. Maybe two or...or three deuces! We'll kick up so much crud, his cows will be shitting mud! Look, _all_ I asked you to do-"

A light tap at the door interrupted Blanchard.

"Enter!" the Colonel barked.

A young lieutenant, notebook in hands, slunk in and then shut the door. He nodded at the two Majors before turning his attention to the rosy-faced Colonel. Blanchard's bellowing and sundry curses could be heard fifty feet down the hall; the lieutenant had zero desire to enter this chamber of invectives but...duty summoned:

"Our PIO, Lieutenant Haut," Blanchard introduced. "I asked him to join. _Ahem_...I had hoped you'd be here sooner, lieutenant."

Haut looked nervous and consulted his notebook before reporting, "I...um...sir, I just got off the phone with a reporter from the _Roswell Daily Record_. He called and asked me to verify a rumor."

Blanchard had started to raise his mug, but his arm stopped halfway between the desk and his mouth.

"Um...so..." stammered Haut, "the...um...reporter's name-"

"I don't care _what_ his name is," Blanchard growled. " _What_ did he want?"

"Right...well, um...sir, he said the paper is...they're running a story tomorrow about an object...I guess...it crashed in the desert...nearby. He...the, um...reporter...implied it came from...I mean, it's too damn foolish to consider, but I thought you should be aware. He claims it's from...um...outer space. Like...Mars...or something...sir."

"Outer space?" jeered Blanchard.

"Foster," Marcel muttered. "I knew he wouldn't keep his trap shut."

"My money is on the Brazel fella," Sam said. "He thinks those creatures came from space, in flying disks."

The Colonel sighed. Three bodies, in a basket, attached to a balloon. None of it made sense. Now...Martians? He eyeballed Major Pix...a sorry, wrinkled mess. Then Major Marcel...less wrinkled...and he knew Jesse from the war, flew with him, and Jesse Marcel kept an even keel.

"No markings?" asked Blanchard, as his peppers pinballed between both Major's. "Mummified bodies? You're _certain_ -"

"Yes, sir," Sam interrupted. "With maps. Wearing jumpsuits. O2 masks."

"Hold on," Haut squawked, wide-eyed. "This is _true_?"

"It _ain't_ Martians," answered Sam. "Not unless they flew from Mars in a balloon."

"Enough," Blanchard said as he dragged the Western Electric rotary across the desk. "I suppose I better ruffle a couple feathers. Go take a powder and have a seat outside. We'll see what's-what and then...and then we'll see about dragging the debris here."

***

An hour later, Blanchard opened his door and motioned the three inside. Sam had heard muffled shards of the phone conversation through the wall: agitated rumbles, obscenities, long stretches of _"uh-huh"_ , and a terse, _"You gotta be shitting me, Roger!"._ Now, the Colonel looked haggard; tie removed, top button of his dress shirt undone, he collapsed into his creaky chair and ran a hand over his face before saying:

"I'll be blunt, men. We've a problem. First things first: Lieutenant, you need to fire a release _ASAP_. I've gone about putting it together for you." Blanchard flicked a single paper off his desk; it fluttered to the floor in seesaw motion. Haut bent over, picked up the sheet, and read in silence. Then he read again...

And _then_ , Haut looked at Blanchard, cleared his throat and asked, "Are you sure _this_ is what you want me to say, sir?"

"I'm sure. This isn't my call. I know it's going to make your job a million times more difficult, but this comes from the brass."

"A million times! You think?"

"Don't be cute. Just do it. Then I need you to get a picture of Major Marcel with whatever it was he brought from the desert. A couple shots. Jesse, grab some foil or something and stand there with a big grin on your ugly mug."

"Yes, sir," Marcel said.

Blanchard continued: "Submit a picture to the _Daily Record_. We're to be transparent. Take all calls, answer them with decorum, and consult my release. Don't say anything but what's in your hands. Understand?"

Haut looked like he was trying to swallow a boulder but croaked, "Yes, sir."

"You two, get out of here and get on it. Major Pix, we need to chat."

Marcel gave Sam a half-hearted pat on the shoulder as he left. When they were alone, Blanchard told him to rest his butt.

"You worked in D.C. before coming to Roswell," Blanchard said (not asked) while our pal settled into the chair.

"A brief period, sir. June '45 to January of this year. Development and Research Board."

"Doing what?"

"I don't think I'm supposed to say."

"Mm...but now you're here. You fucked up, huh?"

"In a manner-of-speaking."

"Right. What is it you want to do?"

"Want to do?"

"It can't be chasing balloons."

"No, sir. I'd like to fly again but I think it's off the table for the time being."

"You want my assessment? _The time being_ , as you put it, is the rest of your career in the army. You want to fly again? Sit tight, Major. You'll be twiddling thumbs until those in the know cycle out. A long time, in other words."

Sam broke his rule on eye contact and looked at his hands.

"I was on the blower with Brigadier General Ramey," Blanchard said. "He of the 8th Air Force, your old outfit. You know the General?"

"I've heard of Cowboy. He's a legend."

"Ramey's the top dog in Fort Worth. Rubs elbows with the chiefs in D.C. I mentioned your name and he proceeded to tickle my ear with a convoluted story involving a General's wife and some hanky-panky. Sound familiar?"

"Yes, sir."

"Ramey tells me you were in-line to start flying at Groom Lake until your dingdong got ants-in-the-pants."

"Yes, sir."

"You want a shot at Groom Lake?"

Sam perked in the chair.

"Uh-huh," Blanchard droned. "It's yours for the taking, Major. Groom Lake or wherever the heart desires. You help put this balloon business to bed and you can pick your duty station."

"Are you serious?"

"I am, but don't start smiling too soon. This is going to be a hell-of-a snow job. We need to put on the thinking caps."

"Yes, sir. I'll do whatever it takes."

Blanchard sighed and then asked, "What do you want first? Good news or bad news?"

"I suppose the good."

"The good news is, we have a buffer. Enough time to clear the shit out of Shinola. But the window is small, and this is going to be an all-night slog. Twenty-four hours, okay? In twenty-four hours, _everything_ must be spic-and-span. I've the PIO lobbing smoke-grenades, a little cover story. Which leads to the bad news. There wouldn't be a cover story if the news was good. You understand?"

"Yes, sir."

"The doodad you saw out there, Major? With the three bodies inside? You called it a cockpit. Not a bad guess. I thought you were a few gallons short of a full tank, but after speaking with Ramey and the Pentagon...let's say it's high test."

"One of ours?"

"Fuck no! You'd think we lose track of a manned-balloon?"

Sam didn't know if Blanchard was trying to be funny but assumed the Colonel wasn't in the practice of telling jokes. "Sir, at this point, nothing would surprise me."

"Yeah? Well, I'm _certain_ you're about to eat those words. Get comfortable, Major Pix. I've a little story for you...and it's a doozy."

Sam got comfortable but relaxation became an afterthought once Colonel Blanchard got rolling...

***

Released to news outlets by Public Information Officer Haut of the Roswell Army Air Field, the first reports appeared in newsprint the following morning. From the _San Francisco Chronicle_ , 8 July 1947:

The many rumors regarding the flying disc became a reality yesterday when the intelligence office of the 509th Bomb group of the Eighth Air Force, Roswell Army Air Field, was fortunate enough to gain possession of a disc through the cooperation of one of the local ranchers and the sheriff's office of Chaves County. The flying object landed on a ranch near Roswell sometime last week. The rancher was able to contact the sheriff's office, who in turn notified Maj. Jesse A. Marcel of the 509th Bomb Group Intelligence Office. Action was immediately taken and...

# 8. The Hanger

"This is bizarre," Marcel said, in a voice lacking inflection, as he stared at the trailing convoy in the Willys crooked side mirror: two CCKW's (deuce-and-a-half in common jargon), with a dozen enlisted volunteers in each, and a third deuce with a hydraulic lift used for loading ordinance on bombers. When pressed by Blanchard, Sam estimated the cockpit weighed less than a Disney Rocket, or under 4,500 pounds. But who knew? If the lift couldn't raise the vehicle...well...back to the drawing board he'd go.

When Blanchard explained what he _thought_ they _might_ _be_ dealing with, Sam remained stone-faced as his mind processed the information. There wasn't a _might be_ about it. It _seemed_ pretty damn clear. Besides, somebody up the chain connected dots which meant...even if it wasn't what it _might be_ , it might as well be. As such, it be.

When the Colonel finished, he wiped his brow and apologized for the tempest of bad news. Thanks to the chain-of-command, it became Sam's problem to collect the mess. Despite the situation, this recovery wasn't different from the fifty odd times he dragged a balloon from the desert. While Blanchard mustered the 509th and fished the enlisted ranks for volunteers, Sam organized the vehicles from the motor pool.

At dusk, Blanchard gathered everyone in an empty hanger on the outskirts of the air base and told them their jamboree had to be zipped before the sun rose. Rumors had started among the marshaled, but Blanchard soothed in an _"aw shucks, this ain't nothing but mop-up duty"_ tone and promised to procure the men several cases of beer for their trouble.

"Bizarre about describes it," Sam answered, as he stuffed a copious wad of tobacco into his mouth.

"What do you think the Nips were trying to accomplish?"

"It's their half-ass attempt at an invasion. Guess it worked. Sort of."

"Three men in a balloon? What were they gonna do? March to the White House and shoot the President?"

"You know, it's one of them...whatchacallit? Fifth Estate or sumptin."

"Huh?"

"When the bad fellas plant their own into the good fellas population. Them bad fellas sneak around and create mayhem."

"Like spies?"

"No, like subversives. Except, not _like_. Blanchard said the Nips launched lots of balloons. Most of 'em carried bombs. This one had men. You know why? The bomb balloons didn't do jack and squat. But neither did the men except..."

"Except?"

" _Except,_ this funny business is affecting my drinking time. I should be belly up instead of digging Butterhead mummies out of the desert."

"You're thinking about drinking? What's the matter with you?"

Sam dribbled a stream of brown juice into an empty soda bottle and then shrugged.

"You're not shocked by _any_ of this?" Marcel asked.

"I got done being shocked years ago."

"I hear you. Who'd have thought a single bomb could level a city?"

"Well, sure, there's the bomb, but atomic weapons are the tip of the iceberg. After the war, I worked in the Pentagon. Weapons research and development."

"Oh, yeah? How'd you score such cushy duty?"

"Good luck, bad luck, I don't know. Right now, I'm leaning towards bad. This balloon is nutin but an annoyance. I could construct sumptin better with a few beers and a box of crayons."

"I'll grant you the balloon is rudimentary."

Sam spat into the bottle and grunted.

"Weapons research," mused Marcel. "Now you're here, huh? By choice?"

"I'll give you one guess."

"All right, spill it. Whose leg did you piss on?"

"You know, the wrong General's leg."

"Run your mouth?"

" _Ahem_...his old lady did."

Marcel cocked his head, snorted and then asked, "Mamie?"

"Fuck and no. Mamie looks like a hound dog."

"It musta been somebody important."

"I had a good thing," Sam said, as he looked out the window. "A chance to do some real flying again. I wanted to drive fighters but...I got stuck in the 17. Fairy Command, Bomber Command...what a way to spend the war. I'd watch those P-51's and...those Kraut jets. Those Germans...they had creative minds. You should've seen the shit they threw at us."

"Like what?

"Ah...I can't say."

"More top secret than this?"

"Listen, I've fucked up too many times in my career. I'm done running my mouth. This balloon...yeah, it ain't ordinary, but it's a blessing in disguise. All I wanna do is get our pals back to base and get out of the doghouse. Easy as pie. Shouldn't be but a few hours of work."

***

Abeam J.B. Foster's house, Marcel steered the jeep off the gravel road and then watched as the convoy sped past. Meanwhile, the silhouette of the old man appeared in a window. Sam couldn't make out his face, but he pictured the old timer sporting a look of consternation.

As the taillights of the last deuce disappeared inside a sandy veil, the front door opened and Foster strode out, with purpose, holding a longneck in his left claw.

"We have his attention," Sam said.

"Wonderful. Let's chat," Marcel said, sounding anything but inspired.

They met at the fence line: Foster, looking constipated, jabbed the air with a finger while his dogs yelped. "All this?" he barked, spilling beer and gnashing teeth.

"Search and destroy, as promised, courtesy of the U.S. Army." Sam said. "Won't even charge you for the service."

"How generous," Foster said with sass.

Marcel swung his head left to right, craned his neck and then asked: "Where's your foreman?"

"Mac's at home. He's fever's raging."

"He's supposed to be here," Marcel said. "We have some things to discuss."

"Then, you'll have to track him down."

"Which one of you two called the paper?" Marcel asked.

Foster took a pull, joggled head and then answered, "Not I. Might've been Mac. He's been known to run his mouth. Or it could be his wife. Maybe Sheriff-"

"It doesn't matter," Sam interrupted. "Here's the deal, fella. You're gonna hear some weird stuff the next few days. The truth is, we didn't know what it was, but now we do. It's an old weather balloon from the war."

"I knew it!"

"But it's top secret. You follow?" Marcel asked.

Foster nodded.

"And we gotta keep it a secret. Don't ask me why," Sam said, shrugging with contrived ignorance. "The brass wants people to think it's a disk. You'll prolly get reporters callin', asking what's-what."

Foster took another pull, this one a mite longer, and then said, "How 'bout you tell me what I'm _supposed_ to think. That way I won't go mucking your story."

Sam appreciated the man's stubborn indifference. It didn't matter what was rotting on J.B. Foster's land. The old timer wanted it gone and would do whatever it took to make it happen.

"It'd be better," Marcel said, "if you keep your mouth shut. Otherwise-"

"Ayup. I understand. I live out here for a reason and it ain't because I like to chit-chat. You fellows sweep the mess and I'll mind my business. Square deal?"

"Square deal," Sam said.

"There's one thing," Foster added, as he scratched a hairy ear. "Some of my cattle ain't moving too fast these days. I got a dozen downers. They're sick."

"It's not from us," Marcel said.

"How am I to know? A lil suspicious, don't you think?"

Sam patted Foster's arm and said, "There's nothing to worry about. You have any questions, give the base a call and tell 'em you want to speak to Colonel Blanchard. He'll take care of the rest."

***

In a skirmish line, with flashlights pointed forward instead of bayonets, the 509th crept the first site. The soldiers got _most_ of the junk, piecemeal, though using torches proved slow going. Meanwhile, Sam directed the deuce with the lift to the second site. It mashed the scrub like it was breaking toothpicks. Using a compass and map, Sam worried he'd gotten them lost as the muscled driver swore and coughed from the dust. After an hour of meandering, they found the dry gulch -the Clip- and followed its snaky outline north.

At one point, the driver side-eyed Sam and groused, "Jesus H., I _hope_ you know where you're going," ignoring the formality of military bearing to make it clear how irritated he be. "Otherwise, we're liable to get lost."

"We're not lost," Sam said.

"Uh-huh. _Maybe_ not, but I swear I've seen the same goddamned cactus five times in the last twenty minutes."

"Everything looks alike in the desert," Sam snapped. Then, in a display of theatrics, he tapped the compass, watched the needle swing, and said, "Keep it slow. We should see it in a jiff."

A minute later, the driver slammed on the brakes as the headlights illuminated the reddish cockpit.

"Holy cow!" the driver exclaimed. "This it?"

Sam tossed the map and compass on the dash, and then asked, "What the fuck do you think?"

"I think...I don't know if the lift can handle it. We might need to take it apart piece-by-piece."

"There's no time for deconstruction. Colonel wants the site clean ASAP."

"But if-"

Sam opened the door, jumped to the ground out and said, "Back her up and watch my torch. We'll get her snug and shimmy it on."

The driver retorted, "This ain't worth a case of beer. I'm fixing for a hernia after this."

In the end they made it work...but it took a winch, ten ornery men to slither it on the lift, and _a lot_ of curses and sweat. Still, as the cockpit sat cozy on the deuce, covered with a blue tarp, Sam couldn't help but smile.

The S&R had been easier than anticipated...

***

They were back to the base before midnight, sorting and tagging garbage on the floor of the hanger. A total of one hundred pieces were recovered, some no bigger than a thumb. No doubt not all of it. In the morning there'd be one final inspection of the area.

Blanchard put his arm around Sam and whispered, "Heh, Major, you aren't as fucked up as I was led to believe. Good job."

"Is this a compliment?"

"It's an attaboy for dealing with a bad draw. The chiefs in D.C. will be pleased."

"Wonderful."

"Foster's not going to be a problem?"

"Nope. The less he sees of us, the happier he is."

"And the other?"

"He wasn't at the ranch. Foster said Brazel's under-the-weather."

"Hm...you got to pay him a visit in the morning, Major. Get him on the same page as his boss."

The thought of visiting _what's-his-name_ and running into Jules wasn't stimulating...and Sam frowned in trepidation. "How 'bout Major Marcel, huh?" he asked. "I'm-"

"He's gonna be busy with other things."

"Like?"

"Seeing as his face is getting celluloid, I gotta make him available for the media tomorrow morning."

"Fine...I'll give Brazel a call first thing-"

"A _house_ call, Major. Bring a couple MP's to, you know, provide some help."

"Sir, I'm sure the blower will suffice."

"And I find the _appearance_ of authority works better than the suggestion," Blanchard said, squeezing Sam's right bicep. "So...what am I looking at?"

"Eh...rope, eyelets, foil for sun reflection, netting. All of this, at one time, attached the balloon to the basket. We'll sort and then reconstruct as best as possible." Then Sam pointed at spotlight area in the rear of the hanger where two men worked to pry the hatch with a crowbar. "Once they gain access," he explained, "we can remove the crew and see what their papers say. Plans, rendezvous points, who knows what's in there? Maybe information on other balloons."

"And this is the balloon?" Blanchard asked, walking to the edge of canvas spread across the floor. "Big fucker."

"Affirm," Sam said, edging next to the Colonel and crossing arms. "Thirty-three feet in diameter. I can't tell you what's it made of, but you can see it's like a patchwork quilt, with these pieces...I guess they're glued-on in squares. Not the same composition as rubber, but it feels as durable. I couldn't find any visible holes or tears. No clue why it crashed."

"Maybe it didn't crash."

"A strange place to set down. The middle of nowhere?"

"Nowhere means you aren't seen."

"But they're still strapped...hooked to masks...I'd wager they died in transit."

Blanchard sniffed, scanned the hanger and then said, "Guess we'll never know."

"Sir, there is one more thing," Sam said, pointing at a small orange flag jutting from the canvas. "I had it tagged because it's...odd."

They walked over the canvas, towards the marker, and Blanchard remarked, "What isn't odd about this situation?"

"True," Sam said, clicking on a flashlight and then focusing the beam near the flag. Seconds later, they stared down on a tatty square, the torch illuminating: _D.P. 1945._ And then, beneath the first engraving: _Dale Palmer._

"I'll be damned," Blanchard whispered.

"Yes, sir."

"Who is it?"

"You're guess, sir. Maybe a fella who found this thing in 1945 and put his mark on it."

"I don't think-" Blanchard began. But, before he could finish the thought, shouting erupted from the rear of the hanger. The men had pried open the hatch and gestured into the dark maw.

"Leave it be!" the Colonel yelled. "Those bodies need to be handled with gloves!"

"Sure is dusty!" one of the men reported in an animated voice. "And it stinks!"

"We'll come back to Dale," Blanchard said to Sam. "I wanna find out what's in this gizmo. I'll let you and Major Marcel have the honors of pulling them Butterheads out."

# 9. Sickness

Captain Lorenzo Kimball, he of Squadron M, Roswell Base Hospital, was flipping through used bingo cards when his phone rang at three minutes to eleven on Wednesday morning, 9 July. Kimball had _almost_ been the Big Winner last night but the "I" to complete his BINGO hadn't come up and one of the jackoffs in the motor pool walked away with 200 hundred smackers. Eight fucking cards and not one of them a winner. How could this be?

Like a lot of military personnel based in Roswell, Doctor Lorenzo Kimball was bored. So bored, he had been reduced to playing bingo, of all things. Oh, and golf...if you could call the patches of grass amongst the desert a _golf course_. Doctor Kimball _would naught_ affix such a label to the parsimonious travesty: between tee boxes (either crawling with weeds or heaped with ant colonies...and the fuckers were thumb-sized, red and enjoyed biting) and the "greens" (a pat of withered brown grass embellished with scruffy red-and-white checkered flags) sat desert. When you struck a bad tee shot (not "if", in Dr. Kimball's case) the ball would roll forever unless fortune smiled and it stopped snug against a cactus or in a thorny bush. This created other problems, but at least the ball wasn't MIA. Lord knows how many golf balls he'd lose by the end of summer.

Kimball didn't like golf but his superior, Major Jack Comstock, did and they often split in the afternoon to hack through nine. With most of the 509th in Kwajalein engaged in bombing exercises, the base (and, by extension, the base hospital) resembled a ghost town. The jaded base commander, Colonel Blanchard, _always_ joined the pair and the trio bet a nickel-a-hole. The Colonel was good and when he wasn't good he was cheating and when he wasn't cheating he was the base commander which, by addition, meant he won all the time. And the cheap bastard collected _every_ fucking nickel.

Yesterday they were supposed to play with Blanchard, but the old man called in sick. Today they had a tee time at three...otherwise known as the hottest part of the day...but Kimball crossed fingers Blanchard remained under the weather. The forecast: _blistering_. Cloud cover: _nil_. The Captain had no desire to melt like a candle under the sun.

The ringing phone dashed reverie and Kimball sighed as he swept the bingo cards into the trash. He let the ringer trill three times and then dragged the blocky handset to his left ear.

Before he could say boo, Major Comstock's voice rattled: "You need to pay a visit to Colonel Blanchard. His wife just phoned the duty nurse and said he's running a high fever."

"Me?"

"Don't argue. I've a couple of enlisted men who dragged their asses into the infirmary about a half-hour ago. I'm tending to them."

"What is it? Flu or something?"

"Or something."

Kimball looked at his golf clubs, propped in the corner of the small office, and then asked (through a widening smile), "No golf today?"

"I don't think so," Comstock answered.

***

"Bill wasn't feeling well yesterday afternoon," Anne Blanchard said, as she led the young doctor to the master bedroom. "Last night, he couldn't get out of bed. Today, his temperature keeps rising."

Kimball checked his watch, yawned, and then asked, "Has he eaten anything?"

"No. No appetite. I made him soup last night and...he had a little, but he vomited this morning."

"Any blood in the vomit?"

"I-I don't know. It looked like water."

"Bile, I'd say. If his stomach's empty..."

She halted in front of the closed bedroom door and then reported, "He _never_ gets sick."

"Never?"

" _Never._ And his color is awful."

"It's just a bug," Kimball said. "I heard a couple men came into the hospital this morning. Something is making rounds."

Anne Blanchard didn't look mollified but stepped aside as he opened the door.

The room was dark and stuffy; a swamp cooler rumbled. The smell struck Kimball square in the snotbox: a fusty fusion of body odor and flatulence. The Captain coughed -several times- and reached for the light switch.

Colonel Blanchard, appearing as a dark lump atop the bed, covers in a heap at his feet, moaned, "No...lights."

"Bill," his wife said in a singsong voice, "this is a doctor from the hospital. He needs to see you."

"No...lights," Blanchard wheezed.

"Sir, it's Doctor Kimball," hisself rasped. "I need light to examine you. Would it be better if I open the curtains?"

"No... _cough_...lights."

Kimball turned on the light anyway. The Colonel tried to cover his eyes; his hands got halfway to his face then flopped on a dewy as morning grass, hairy chest.

"Bill?" Anne asked, the _illusion_ of perkiness vanishing from her tone. She tried to enter the room, but Kimball pushed her into the hall.

"I need to do an examination," he stated in a firm voice.

"But-"

"He's...right," the Colonel mumbled. "You're going... _cough_...to...get in...the way... _cough_..."

The Missus opened her mouth, but Kimball slammed the door in her face. Then he walked to the bed (listening to Blanchard's wet, labored breathing) and dropped his satchel on the nightstand...next to a jar filled with nickels.

"Sir," Kimball began as he leaned over the Colonel and took a big whiff. The smell...the smell he could handle. He smelled worse things in the war. And he'd also observed men and women on death's door. Blanchard...well, he wasn't about to take a dirt nap, but the Colonel had seen better days. _Color_...terrible; gray, like clay. _Eyes_...red, puffy. _Lymph nodes_...swollen; a sign of infection. And when Kimball touched Blanchard's tacky forehead with the back of his hand, the brow felt like a hotplate.

"I'm...fucked up," Blanchard pronounced.

Though his diagnosis was apt, Captain Kimball determined to maintain a stoic demeanor: "Nothing but a little bug, sir. Before you know it, you'll be playing nine in no time."

"Don't...patronize...me."

"I'm not, sir. Can you tell me when you started feeling unwell?"

Blanchard opened his eyes, or tried to, and squinted at Kimball. "Listen...to me," he croaked, reaching for the Captain's sleeve. "This...is... _cough_...important."

"Yes, sir?"

"Marcel...Major...Pix... _cough_...Monday...night...July...7. Call the Provost Marshall. Get...everyone in...quarantine. This is... _cough_...an...order."

Kimball straightened and asked, "Quarantine who?"

"Check...duty logs of...the five-oh-ninth. We had a...recovery...operation. I'm...not delirious. _Cough._ Something we... _cough hack cough_...dug up...made...me...sick."

"What did you dig up?"

The Colonel pointed at a phone on the varnished tallboy and mustered all his strength in arranging a sentence without panting: " _I'm not fucking around!_ "

"Sir, I-"

"Make... _cough_...the call!"

***

"Blanchard is in rough shape," Kimball whispered to Major Comstock through the receiver as Anne Blanchard lingered within earshot. "Pale, sweaty, swollen lymph nodes, temperature of one hundred...his pulse is one ten, Jack."

"One ten!" Major Comstock cried.

"Uh-huh. He's also ranting about quarantining the five hundred ninth. Said something about a search-and-recovery on Monday. Did you hear about this?"

"An S&R? Monday?"

"Monday evening, saith the old man. If you ask me, he's suffering eccentricities brought about by the fever."

"Hold on," Comstock said. A thud, muffled voices...

The Captain pretended to check his watch; Anne Blanchard picked through the kitchen pantry.

Minutes later, Comstock rejoined the line and reported: "Those soldiers who were admitted this morning are from the five hundred ninth. Similar symptoms as Blanchard, minus the high temperature. Could be related."

"What're you thinking?"

"Oh...maybe...desert fever. Coccidioidomycosis. I've seen cases before but...not as aggressive."

"Blanchard did say they dug something up."

"Can you elaborate?"

"The Colonel wasn't in the mood to make small talk."

"Hm...it's too much of a coincidence to ignore. I'll make some phone calls and see what's-what. In the meantime, I'll send a wagon to you. Keep the Colonel comfortable. We'll talk later."

_Click_.

Kimball puckered lips and cradled the handset.

From behind, Anne Blanchard cheeped: "Is everything okay?"

"Yes, ma'am," Kimball answered, conjuring a pretentious smile as he spun to face herself. "The Colonel has a small bug. Nothing life or death, see, but I'd like to get fluids into him and... _perhaps_...keep him overnight at the hospital."

"Oh my!"

"Better to be conservative."

"Bill hates hospitals."

"Sure, who doesn't? But, at most, it'll be one night," Kimball said, not believing in this in the least.

# 10. Ishii

Shirō Ishii restrained a smile as he listened to the translator.

Standing next to the American officer was a Major in the MVD, a pudgy, snarling man who stared at the Surgeon General with unabashed disgust. If the Soviets had their way, Ishii would stand tall in front of the Tokyo tribunal. The Russians argued he deserved a _Class B_ designation. _Class B_ , by the way, equaled _the hangman_...tho, according to the Russian, hanging seemed far too congenial a fate for a monster like Surgeon General Shirō Ishii. _For crimes against humanity_ _and_ _atrocities against mankind,_ an officer would read from a paper before the hangman pulled the lever. Not only were the words redundant, Ishii bristled at the portrayal. So many war criminals were lumped into this category. Was detonating a bomb capable of destroying a city not a crime?

The answer depended on who played judge, but Ishii understood items of value were beholden to no magistrate. The soon-to-be executed had nothing to give in exchange for their lives. Nothing but vitriol and yellow flesh. After his arrest, Ishii meditated on the course of his future. He read the news on Nuremburg and talked to the American interrogators. _What about the German scientists?_ Ishii inquired. _The doctors and engineers?_ The interrogators shrugged and said the trials were for men who slaughtered innocents. Science, they implied, was incapable of war crimes. This theory became fact not long after his arrest: segregated from the rest of the defendants, Ishii answered hundreds of questions from U.S. Army intelligence officers. Later, one of the men handed him a paper and a pencil and told him to write about his activities, beginning at Kyoto University and ending as Surgeon General in the Japanese First Army. _Everything,_ the American stressed, tapping the paper _._

When Ishii finished and the American departed with the autobiography, he felt a pang of regret. His compunction wasn't based on the activities he, or others under his command, did in the name of science. Ishii would _never_ apologize for his behavior. Rather, there was one more event he should've added, perhaps the biggest confession, in a list of eyebrow raising actions. Part of him hoped one of his butterflies succeeded, but as months progressed, he knew it couldn't be. The planning had been quick and the crews ill-prepared. His life's work, his destiny, had been rushed into a hasty offensive bound to fail. Ishii blamed the military and the desperate reactionaries; he tried to convince them they were motivated by fear instead of reason. _Humph_. Had the Imperial Army listened to Shirō Ishii, Tojo and the rest wouldn't be standing in judgement in this farce of a tribunal.

And Ishii wouldn't be left to ruminate on what could be...

Yet, the Japanese saying about the drowning cricket and the lily pad has some truth, even to war criminals. Deep waters surrounded Ishii but a path to the shore appeared. After all, his work was organized; it shouldn't go to waste. The Americans would appreciate empirical data culled from the disciplined hand of a scholar. However, should his work did not entice, he carried a secret capable of attracting their attention.

But it didn't come to this...

Which kinda sorta disappointed our sadistic pal Ishii...

***

" _Sickness...delves into the enemy populace delivering a death blow prolong and potent. Latent and lasting. Cruel without condition of treaty. Disease is the ultimate weapon for it is unstoppable."_

Scipio Africanus, he a Roman general who defeated the Carthaginian Hannibal at Zama in 202 B.C. to end the 2nd Punic War, presented this quantifiable argument. The words impressed Ishii when he read them as a youth. He copied the declaration and committed it to memory, first in Japanese and then in Latin. Scipio became Shirō Ishii's inspiration and his words warmed the young man through the cruel winters of doubt.

His obsession was fashioned from the enthralling tomes of antiquity. War could be reduced to a well-played game of chess, or a poorly played one, but the end result never varied. Bodies of men banging into each other, projectiles hurled, the senseless barrage of destruction into perpetuity. Ishii saw hope in something less barbaric born in the mind of a barbarian.

Peers laughed at him. Instructors ridiculed. 'Oh Ishii,' they clucked, 'a doctor is meant to save people, not make them sick.'

In college he played with petri dishes and grew cultures of bacteria. He dropped spores into the tea of his mockers and chuckled when they fell ill. Then the rapscallion Ishii cured them with miraculous insight. Soon people weren't laughing at Ishii. Emboldened, the scholar studied the Hun army in France. Desperate to break the stalemate at the Western Front, the Germans resorted to chlorine gas. Chemical weapons had a place in combat, but they were also constrained by environmental conditions and _proper_ protective appurtenances: enemy troops in the quagmires and bleak trenches developed suitable masks and defensive dress. Biological weapons though, launched from afar, had the capacity to inflict superior damage. Infrastructure, progeny, up the chain to the leadership...if the attack was planned _appropriately_. This -appropriate planning- became Ishii's obsession and emphasis of education.

His post-university research on World War I chemical and biological warfare caught the eye of Sadao Araki, the Minister of the Army. In advocating the use of biological weapons, Ishii found promotion to senior army surgeon and earned the approval of the nationalist warmongers who desired to make Japan a mighty empire and not a sniveling nation at the mercy of Western penchants. Showa 7: Ishii was appointed head of the "Epidemic Prevention Research Laboratory", established in the Chinese puppet-state of Manchukuo, known as Unit Tōgō. His instructions: _education and then necessary preparation to avert a biological or chemical attack from decimating the Japanese Army_. The task required drastic, but _essential_ , methods: engaging in the _promotion_ of endemic disease using the hapless Chinese as test subjects.

Unit Tōgō was a starting point for the future of Japanese depravity, but the research had practical applications in the real world. Bleeding out a test subject with different types of cuts disclosed how long someone could maintain consciousness and accomplish tasks. Prisoners were injected with diseases and then opened; these vivisections presenting the inner workings of the human body under stress. The life expectancy of a prisoner was about a month, but the Japanese squeezed every possible drop of information from their patients.

Tōgō was shut down in the summer of 1934 after several prisoners escaped and spread word about the camp. No matter: Ishii transferred his operation to a locality in the district of Pingfang, near the city of Harbin. Known to the residents as the "Epidemic Prevention and Water Purification Department of the Kwantung Army", the military called the new base _Unit 731_.

Thanks to Ishii's research, the Imperial Japanese Army conducted biological warfare in the late-1930's. Showa 12: during the Second Sino-Japanese War, the Kwantung dropped bombs on Nanking containing fleas infested with Bubonic Plague. Japanese scientists and military leaders watched this experiment unfold with clinical curiosity. At stake: _perhaps_ the key to world domination. Success at Nanking would standardize the use of biological weapons in China. If plague decimated the Chinese populace, soldiers and hardware could be exhausted in other theaters of operation.

Prime Minister Hideki Tojo discerned a showdown with the West. Not only did he forecast confrontation, he sponsored the conflict. Blame, Tojo announced, resided on the colonization of Asia by the _Gai-ko_ , their manipulation of commerce and the subjugation of Asian people. Japan had benevolent intentions; the Emperor wanted to unify the Oriental nations as one. This conglomeration would defy the West. Of course, some of these nations were beyond fusing. China, for instance, was a backwards land mounded with a mongrel populace. The _chankoro_ were soft and a staggering burden on the infrastructure. Once China was solved, the remainder of the protectorates could be tackled. In order to undertake this overwhelming task, the Japanese required a military at or near full strength _and_ have tricks up their sleeves. The biological warfare program, commencing with Nanking plague bombs, would be one of the wiles.

Alas, the results of the attack proved inconclusive. Plague spread, in isolated areas of the Yangtze River region, but Ishii connived pure happenstance: the Yangtze districts were unclean and prone to epidemics. Ishii, however, deemed the setback a minor annoyance, and the Japanese Army did not scrap their expectations of a biological weapon capable of administering massive casualties. Tojo told the war ministers and the Emperor to have patience; with the blessing of the Prime Minister, more time, space and "logs" were allotted for Ishii's sawmill.

Following the suppression of the Chinese, Japanese interests turned towards the colonial powers of England, Holland and the United States. The preliminary efforts of Unit 731, the plague bombing experiments, were trifling compared to the tests conducted later. The complex was designed in the fashion of a military compound with barracks, mess halls and exercise yards. The official name did not betray the drudgery of Ishii and his staff. But anyone delivered to the Water Purification Department by the Japanese Military Police, the Kempeitai, learned the real purpose of Unit 731.

The exercise yard was a popular site for research activity. For instance, prisoners were trussed and subjected to bombs rigged with everything from ball-bearings to bacteria. The blast radius of shells and mines were ascertained for combat efficiency and mortality. Moreover, prisoners could be studied under various meteorological conditions. Survival times in cold or warmth with a litany of injuries were compared and analyzed. Tied to stakes, bleeding from blasts, exposed to contagions and the weather, Ishii and his doctors established the best way to kill or treat a casualty.

With dorms and classrooms, the campus of Unit 731 resembled a university more than a torture facility. Select Kwantung medical students were afforded opportunities in study different from their civilian counterparts in Japan or other refined countries in the world. The ability to conduct vivisections on prisoners, observing how the live human body operated, contained a treasure of information. Students practiced radical techniques of surgery on the detainees; these techniques were incorporated on the battlefield. It's important to remember the experiments at Harbin offered a rare look for doctors to assess and observe the human _in situ_.

From a scientific point-of-view, Unit 731 was a gold mine. From a humanitarian perspective, it was a slaughterhouse. There was no middle ground and the Japanese didn't bother to disguise their exertion. Prisoners were expended at about 800 per week. The need for test subjects became prodigious; PW's were delivered from all over the Co-Prosperity Sphere. The differences in race gave the Japanese a chance to engage in ideological study. Anatomic variances between the American and Korean phallus were debated, among other things.

Trivial physical discrepancies didn't concern Ishii. He found this exploration a waste of time. Instead, he pressed with creating the ultimate biological weapon. Building upon the Nanking attack, Unit 731 deployed bubonic plague, cholera, anthrax and other agents in trials and on the battlefield, killing over 10,000 civilians and PW's. Ishii presented his findings to the War Ministry in Tokyo. Among those in attendance: Hirohito's brother, Prince Chichibu. Later, Ishii received the Grand Order of the Kite, Fourth Order, for his exemplary work. Thus, it would be fair to say the Emperor knew of Unit 731's existence.

In the Year of the Horse, Showa 17 (1942 on the Western Calendar), overconfidence gripped the Japanese. Growth into East Asia and the South Pacific went unimpeded by a moribund American war machine left for dead. Success begat success: Pearl Harbor, Wake, the Philippians, Singapore and Indonesia. This glut of territory came with a price. Overexpansion weakened the fringes of the empire. The Battle at the Coral Sea checked hubris, but just for a stretch. The result of this skirmish went down as a draw. Yet, for the first time, the Americans stood tall to the Japanese Navy. The future appeared rosy as 1942 bled into 1943. However, Japan soon felt the weight of the angry and industrialized United States.

Starting at the Midway Atoll, the weir broke and the cascade overwhelmed. Midway had been an exorbitant defeat and more of the same followed in rapid succession: Guadalcanal, Rabaul, and various specks scattered throughout the Pacific with names worth remembering but far too many to list in totality. Pecked away they were, one scratch at a time. Desperate, Tojo visited Ishii in the fall of 1943. The Prime Minister regurgitated rumors of something ultimate, a terrible weapon...but then he confessed the Germans weren't forthright or they were on the wrong track. Japanese engineers planned to visit Berlin but it appeared a worthless endeavor, at least to Tojo.

"It doesn't matter," Tojo mused, as he massaged his mustache. "The Germans are worried about their conflicts and we are left to brawl alone. At least our problem, for the moment, is singular. We have one beast pursuing us."

Ishii sipped tea and listened to the Prime Minister. Tojo had compelled the Emperor into war, releasing this _beast_ , and the recent setbacks had undermined his support. Some in the Imperial Army called for Tojo's job, others his head. Ishii wasn't a fan of regime change and Tojo had given him the resources to pursue his love of science.

But Tojo hadn't come to gossip or lament. He came to press Ishii for results.

"Your work," Tojo continued, "is meant for something more than entertainment."

"My work is sacred," Ishii hissed. "It is not a lark."

"Then...entertainment is not the correct word. Education...hm? _Perhaps_...but let me be blunt: you can train your doctors but this will have no value if the war is lost. It's time to make use of the biological research. We need to deliver a device capable of killing many of the enemy. First kill, then disable."

"I understand."

"A device delivered beyond the front, to the shore of America."

"I'm developing the weapon, but I lack the means."

"Soon the means will be at your fingertips. The Ninth Army's Research Laboratory, under Major General Sueyoshi Kusaba, has begun testing high altitude balloons. I'm not sure of the science, but Kusaba asserts the balloons can use a strong current of air flowing at high altitude and speed east over the ocean towards North America."

"I've heard of this. Oishi's theory on strong westerlies."

"Yes...Oishi. I confess, it is beyond my scope of understanding. I've listened to Kusaba and he wants to make use of these perceived winds. He alleges a balloon can travel over the ocean in sixty-five hours. Imagine a device attached to the balloon, an incendiary. Think of the damage it would do."

"I can imagine something more destructive."

"I'm sure you can. We must start with exploratory missions, General. No sense in strapping a biological skyward to have it fall unused into the sea. The plan is to construct a fleet of balloons, armed with bombs, so-named Operation Fu-Go. Balloon Bomb. Kusaba foresees a conflagration, forest fires triggered by the falling fire balloons. It will strike fear into the populace and disrupt the war effort of the imperialists. Think what will be..."

Ishii remained stoic as Tojo raved for ten minutes about the might of Fu-Go. For several logical reasons, the idea sounded preposterous. It dawned on Ishii the extent of the problem facing Japan if fanciful dreams were being coddled to _prolong_ the war.

The inability to steer the balloons meant wind selected course. Bombs causing forest fires wouldn't have more of an effect on the infrastructure of the U.S. than infernos triggered by lightning. The Americans weathered Pearl Harbor and the ugly first months of the war, responding with Doolittle's bombing of Tokyo. Ishii didn't think a few fires would dampen their spirits. If nothing else, it'd make the Imperialists angrier.

At last, Tojo said, "I read your face. You are not impressed."

"The idea has merit," Ishii responded with tact. "But...eh...fires are not a solution."

"I agree, which is why I'm here. These first attacks will give us time to study how to rig the balloons with your weapons. I want you to work with Kusaba. Create a strategy. Now is your time to sparkle, Ishii."

Beginning in November 1944, and spreading over the next few months, the Japanese launched 9,500 Fu-Go balloons. The results proved disappointing or inadequate (depending on disposition), owing to the low success rate of the balloons and/or American news blackout. It was also winter in the Northern Hemisphere. Lower temperatures and wet weather hampered the effectiveness of combustible ordinance. In reality (though unknown to the Japanese), about 300 balloons made it across the Pacific. They scattered south-to-north from Mexico to British Columbia and as far east as Detroit, Michigan. One balloon was responsible for the only casualties of the entire Fu-Go operation: six people (a pregnant woman and five children) were killed near Bly, Oregon, when a bomb exploded on a balloon found during a hike. Still, the American military took the threat serious enough to develop contingency plans to deal with the menace.

The military also did an amicable job of keeping the nature of Fu-Go surreptitious. The censored press presented negligible information on the balloon attacks. Several intrepid reporters labelled the objects as "unidentified" flying projectiles, echoing similar claims to the stories of Foo Fighters seen over Europe. It seemed people wanted to believe in the existence of flying disks from outer space more than the reality of new, heinous weapons.

By the spring of 1945, the Japanese were ready to abandon Fu-Go. Tojo was gone by then, forced to resign as the war disintegrated into a string of defeats. Kusaba considered the operation a monumental waste and delighted to rid himself of the obligation. Two of the three hydrogen factories had been destroyed by American bombing raids. Other weapons were found to be more destructive. Airplanes proved an effective bomb when guided by a motivated pilot; manned torpedoes were employed; suicidal attacks by soldiers strapped with grenades. These were more successful than the balloons, but nothing stemmed the adversary. After the Germans surrendered in May 1945, the Soviets turned their attention on the Japanese. The remaining Axis Power had to tangle alone with the rest of the world.

Desperate, Ishii approached the Army and demanded they do something with his pestilent bombs. Would they use them on the invaders? _No,_ the Army said. _We wouldn't want to endanger our troops_. Next, he proposed using kamikaze airplanes launched from submarines carrying pathogens developed by Unit 731. Code named "Operation Cherry Blossoms at Night", the planes would crash into metropolitan areas of Southern California, releasing fleas infected with plague. This idea couldn't progress past the planning stages for numerous reasons, the biggest being the Imperial Navy didn't want to risk their new I-400 model submarines for a mission destined to fail. Ishii returned to the idea of using balloons to do the labor. This time, though, he ensured the chances of success were increased by adding crew.

There were many variables to calculate, but Ishii approached the exercise like a puzzle: experiments on prisoners in altitude chambers by Unit 731 yielded useful data on time-of-consciousness and the operational ability of man at high altitudes. There appeared a sweet spot in the westerlies around 5500 meters. Radiosonde equipped balloons had disseminated winds aloft as being somewhat slower than at 6000 meters. The temperature (-20 degrees C), while cold, was tolerable given proper embellishments. The 9,000-kilometer trip to the West Coast of the United States would be quicker at 18000 meters...but cruising at this height for an extended period required supplemental oxygen. The crew _could_ survive at 5500 meters in the lower pressure but, when they neared the West Coast, they'd be obligated to climb. Jettisoned of ballast, the balloon would float to 20000 meters, high above the ceiling of airplanes and the range of anti-aircraft guns. The math had to be exact. Zero ballast, full of gas, the airships soared; at this altitude, crews would be obligated breathe the inadequate canned air until their target of opportunity presented. Then, after the pilot vented hydrogen, the balloon would sink to the ground.

The original plan Ishii constructed called for the balloons to be released from a carrier in the Pacific, but the Americans controlled the seas. Instead, he decided to launch from Honshu. The longer trip lowered chances for success, and consideration hadn't been made for biological functions. Urination, if necessary, would be accomplished in the _oshikko shokudō_ , pee canteen, the same type Navy pilots used on extended excursions. Defecation...not possible. But, Ishii concluded, waste removal wouldn't be an issue since the crews weren't bringing food. They were allocated a canteen of water for each, which would be sufficient for up to a week if the men maintained strict discipline.

The journey was an exercise in dead reckoning. Fly a heading, measure the elapsed time over the surface based on celestial objects, determine course deviation, correct. The expanse of the Pacific provided limited ground-based references. Big islands had to be avoided; there the enemy dwelt with airplanes and anti-aircraft guns. Japanese I-Class submarines were dispatched to provide low-frequency non-directional beacons, and the balloons could hone the signal with automatic directional finding equipment, however the I-Class would have limited surface time due to the American Navy. Radio stations along the West Coast of the United States, in the AM radio band, provided a supplementary source of navigation, but only when the craft drifted within range. The actual factual? Once airborne, the balloons could expect almost zero directional assistance.

Ishii also struggled to master the tight weight restrictions. 450 kilograms: the balloon's load capacity; anything more prevented the airship from attaining high altitudes. 440 kg's: sum of the vehicle, ballast, supplemental oxygen, and crew. Adding a 15 kg ordinance to the equation made the balloon too heavy. The engineers wanted to reduce the crew to one, but Ishii argued a single man compromised mission achievement. And a crew of two wasn't enough for Ishii's liking. Once the balloon landed, someone need be responsible for detonating the bomb in a populated area or water source. A single individual, even two in a weakened state, lacked sufficient strength to transport the bomb for an indeterminate amount of time and distance.

Thus, Ishii faced a stressing quandary: calculation dictated the impossibility of transporting men _and_ bomb. One or the other, not both. After stressing on this dilemma for a night, Ishii devised a new strategy: why not make the crew and the weapon one in the same? Yes...but the information needn't be shared with them. Instead, small phials of the agent were deposited in the "bomb", a hollow cylinder fixed under the seat of the Epidemic Specialist. Upon landing, the bomb would be removed, the agent dumped into water, and the men...they'd mingle with as many people as possible. It didn't matter if they were caught. The soldiers wouldn't last long in captivity; the crewmen would be sick and unable to provide information to their captors. Better yet, they had the capacity (though the research suggested less than one percent transference per 1,000 people) to infect those who encountered them.

All the planning...the long nights bent over books...scratching paper with pen...in the end, Ishii realized the venture wouldn't amount to anything. He came to this conclusion and yet...he wanted to forge ahead because Ishii was a scientist. But with ten balloons and three crews attached to each...bah! One or ten crews wouldn't make a difference. The communicable distribution of biological agents on large populations would be successful _en masse_ , not in sprinkles. He lobbied for a hundred balloons, three hundred crewmen. The Imperial Army shunned his requests. If Ishii had done his job, they argued, ten balloons would be enough! Little did they understand...but they'd comprehend when the Americans walked into Tokyo. And Ishii would laugh at all of them, the stupid men who shunned him...just like he laughed at the professors in college and the logs who screamed at him before he sliced open their chests and prodded their beating hearts. It was he who laughed as they bleated, and cried, and whimpered.

A month after the balloons were launched, the Americans dropped the super bombs and the Emperor capitulated. Ishii was busy then, collecting data from his labs in Harbin and Unit 731. And, yes, he _might've_ been frightened. Academic resolve in the face of cruel antagonists crumbled for a time. He went on the run for a few months, hiding in rural China with colleagues until the Soviets found him and returned him to Tokyo...

***

...and in Tokyo he made his play for immunity. The Americans were interested. Their _Gaijin Shogun_ in Asia, MacArthur, wanted to distance the Emperor and his family from the radicalism of the Japanese military. Propping up a stable government in Tokyo would counter the communist aggression in China and the Soviet Union. Therefore, Tojo and his subordinates took the blame for the war and the human rights violations. Ishii didn't comprehend the politics but, judging from the expression on the face of the Russian, Shirō Ishii was safe.

The American officer began talking; he spoke so fast, the interpreter had difficulty keeping the dialogue.

"My Russian associate is not pleased by this bartering, but people in my government want your knowledge," the American said through the translator.

Ishii bowed and maintained eye-contact with the American. If he looked at the Russian, he feared bursting into laughter.

"My Soviet comrade requires a word," the American said, stepping aside. The MVD agent scowled and pushed the translator aside; he grabbed Ishii on the shoulder and barred yellow teeth.

" _Anata o fakku, sukamu,_ " he gnashed in passable Japanese. Then he glared at the translator and rattled something sinister in Russian before leaving the room.

The translator stuttered, "He...he...desires to...to...meet you again."

Ishii smiled and thought: _N_ _ot probable, comrade_.

***

In May 1947, the Americans transported Shirō Ishii to Fort Detrick, Maryland; the immunity he sought came with an expected consequence: our Jap doctor was tasked with assisting in the advancement of the U.S. bio and chemical weapons program. Many of the Western specialists were -for the most part- impressed by the Oriental's zeal, and his practical knowledge advanced Detrick's program ahead of schedule.

Now we find Ishii in July, 1947...

He attended a celebration in D.C. on the Fourth, enjoying fireworks over the National Mall despite curious and/or menacing side-eyes. On the seventh, a Monday, it was business as usual. Tuesday went without excitement as he and Dr. Edwin Hill, a microbiologist, teamed on a project involving bacterial purifications.

Wednesday evening, 9 July, a visitor knocked at Ishii's door as he listened to the radio, an Emerson 510 Model purchased with his first payment check. The radio was a delightful distraction, and Ishii developed a fascination for a show called "Strike It Rich". In Japan there'd be no entertainment like "Strike It Rich". People groveling for money lacked honor. On the other hand, the spectacle of human misery reminded Ishii of his work in Unit 731.

The harsh _knock-knock_ broke him from a self-reflective stupor. He set aside a martini, stood, stretched, and then opened the door of his BOQ suite. The caller, a tall man (of course, everyone looked tall to Ishii...but this visitor was _enormous_ ) with a wide smile...tho, it resembled a leer more than a smile...but Ishii pushed this unpleasant observation aside...

The visitor and his smile (or leer) entered the apartment without waiting for an invitation. He just...stepped across the threshold, forcing Ishii to move out of the way, and scanned the room before blasting a hacking cough (or, perhaps, it was a scoff). Under his left arm, a satchel; he removed the fedora with his right hand. A jagged scar ran from the left ear, over a bald scalp, to behind his right ear.

Ishii willed his slanty peepers away from the sutured monstrosity. And he stifled a grumble about the man's pushy behavior. He was told _occasional_ visits from different handlers were a necessary evil. _They_ didn't trust "the Jap", and six different "guests" had already inspected his domicile for -Ishii assumed- papers and miscellaneous. In each instance, Ishii stood aside and made airy conversation in rudimentary English...

Which is what he attempted with the latest intrusion: Bowing at the waist, the Jap greeted, "Hay-ro, sure."

"Hiya," grunted the man.

"Can...I...herp...you?"

Our scarred hero scanned the room, then flung the hat on the sofa and unzipped a leather Washington Senators coat. He wore the blasted thing, even though it be hot as blue blazes (and muggy, to boot), because the jacket was his talisman. Yes, there's a long, incredible story about what the coat meant to our pal...in fact, he treated the thing with a reverence _everyone_ in the CIG found odd...but, the long and the sort of it is this: he'd take the Senators jacket with him to New Mexico because, as Bill Donovan briefed, _'We need something besides good work to get the job done'_.

"Can...I...herp...you?" Ishii repeated.

"I hope so, chief. Come here and have a seat at your kitchen table, kay? We got a few things to kick around."

"Wool you enjoy a cock-tar?" Ishii asked in an affable voice.

"I want you to sit down, Butterhead. And just so we're on the same page, I don't like being in the same room with you."

Through a frozen, shit-eating grin, Ishii fell into a chair and then stammered, "Par...Par-don?"

"Look, I don't know how much English you understand, little man, but I couldn't round up a translator with the proper clearance on short notice."

"I-"

"So we'll have to make due, you and me," the visitor steamrolled. "I'm sure we can reach a middle-ground in the language barrier. At least...see, on the one hand, I have my job to think about; on the other, I kinda hope we get off on the wrong foot." He shrugged, smiled, and then said, "It's complicated, Butterhead. What you need understand is, there's one universal way we _can_ communicate. Can you comprehend what I'm telling you?"

Ishii frowned.

The man tossed the satchel on the table, slid out a chair with his foot and fell into the seat with a sigh. Slow-like, he unbuckled the straps and upended the bag, spilling documents in an uneven mound. He pushed a couple black-and-whites at Ishii, crossed arms and then said, "All right, Butterhead, let's get to business. Take a look at these here pictures fresh from the dark room."

"Wart is..." Ishii croaked as pawed at the photographs. The first two pictures displayed rubbish spread over a weedy area: foil, tape, rods, canvas, and frayed lengths of rope. Ishii recognized the junk, but he maintained a stony expression. Before he could flip to the third picture, the man whistled and snapped his fingers.

"Don't play dumdum with me," he yapped, pointing at the radio. "Tell me you don't understand what Todd Russell is saying."

Ishii cleared his throat.

"Last chance or I stop playing nice," our newest hero said.

"I'm granted immunity," Ishii said in serviceable English.

"Whadda ya know? You can talk! Yeah, about the immunity...what a fucking shame."

"A-a shame?"

"I don't care what kinda deal you cut with Dugout Doug. If it were up to me, you'd be hanging from a rope. _Still_ hanging, pal. Yeah, I'd leave you hanging a looooong time."

"What do you want?!" Ishii barked, feeling his cheeks grow warm.

"You ask what _I_ want? Uh-uh. I don't ask for _anything_. You're going to give. Now, sift through those pictures. Tell me what you see with your little slanty eyes. Then we'll compare notes, kay?"

Feeling a smidge excited, Ishii plucked another image...

And sucked air through his teeth.

Three withered corpses, laid atop bedsheets...

_How many made it to America?_ The General wondered.

"What is it?" the man pressed.

"Where is it?" Ishii countered.

"Mm...if you'd been following the papers, you'd have read about a flying disk found near Roswell a few days ago. Except you can't read or comprehend English, correct?"

"Ross-well? Where is-"

"New Mexico. The Southwest. Desert, mountains, scorpions, and snakes. This glamor shot here...the three bodies? Through process of elimination, somebody up the chain believes these sorry looking bastards were your errand boys. Whatever they brought with them has sickened people and livestock. Our guys are scratching their heads, but you know what it is, don't you?"

"Operation Butterfly," Ishii declared, arching his back.

The man jumped to his feet and made for the telephone. "I'm calling for our ride," he announced. "Be ready in ten minutes."

"Where?"

"Roswell, dumdum."

"I'm going?"

"Who better than the monster responsible?"

Ishii grunted. Had he known he'd be on the other end of his handiwork years later...well...as Father used to spout: _Hachiman has a wicked sense of humor._

"I take it you've never visited New Mexico," the man said as he picked up the handset. "It's a bit warm this time of year...kind of like Maryland but with less humidity. What you call a _dry heat_. Could be why your comrades remained preserved for as long as they did, full off the lousy germs you gave 'em."

# 11. Quarantine

Sam wasn't sure where he be, but he felt icky. If his senses were to be trusted...he had to be _humdinged_.

And how!

He opened his eyes, heard snoring, and frowned. Who the fuck was snoring? Jules never snored. The robust rattle...a male...a male full of snot and icky like Sam.

The room was dark; he waited for his eyes to adjust.

His arms were heavy; he tried to lift them one-at-a-time.

Right...and then left.

They wouldn't budge. Not an inch.

And sumptin else...

When he breathed...

His nostrils...they felt peculiar.

Like they were stretched open.

Except, _naught_ like.

Lordy, what in tarnation?

A tube...a tube running into his nose! Or out of it. Sam wasn't sure what direction said tube worked but...but did it matter? _Nope._ And as he reached this conclusion, he exercised his jaw. The stupid tube irritated the back of his throat.

Alarmed, he tried to sit but couldn't move.

He could lift his head, a smidge, and made out a dark strap wrapped around his chest, cinched like a belt. Another of these fastenings bound his ankles and arms.

_For fuck's sake, I'm a prisoner,_ our poor pal thought. _But how_...

Had they bailed over Germany, leaving _Zoë_ to her fate?

If so, Sam expected she crashed into something military as her final act of defiance. He wanted to cry as he thought of her as a burning heap of metal on the ground. His poor girl.

Then he wondered what became of Benny.

Maybe Benny slept next to him.

Sam turned his head as far as the tube would allow but could only discern a drab curtain surrounding him.

No, Benny had his ticket punched.

Benny was on the fast train to Jehovah.

Poor Benny...

But tough breaks were a fact of war. The Hasidic in Brooklyn would name a school after Benny Green...or a deli...or sumptin. Sammy had to forget about his copilot and figure out what he had to do to keep hisself's ass from gettin' turned into ashes. They wouldn't name a school after Sammy Pix in Greenville. Nobody would give a good goddamn. Maybe Ma would cry, but she'd rationalize his death like she had the demise of Walter W. Pix.

And then she'd let the Preacher plow her for good measure...

"Fella," our pal croaked. "Fella...who...there..."

Nutin. Not a light, not a guard, nutin but snoring.

"Where...am...I?" Sam whispered.

Would the Nazis put him in a hospital? Sure, they're barbaric but he wasn't a Jesus killer, just a hick from Mississippi. Pix were English in origin, Daddy once told him, and the English had more in common with the Krauts than most were aware. The Hanover kings were German. Shit, he and the Krauts were almost brothers. Uh-huh. This "unrestrained" bombing campaign... _pfft_! One _big_ misunderstanding. Yep, Sam knew he could convince the Huns of anything. Matter o, he felt right as rain for just waking up and becoming aware he was a prisoner-of-war.

_Too good_.

Painkillers or something. Maybe it be the special "Pilot Salt" tincture the Third Reich gave them Luftwaffe fliers. It wasn't half bad, ifin it was...

"Hey," he moaned. "Hey...you..."

The snoring continued, thick and phlegmy.

"Dale?" he asked in a shaky voice. Sammy knew a Dale...from grade school or...or a bud from the Army Cadet School...or _someone_ in the squadron. Dale...Dale... _something_? Dale... _Green_? Dale... _Dawber_? Dale... _Gray_?

"Ma?" he called. "Ma...I'm....havin' a...a...bad dream, Ma."

_Ma ain't here, Sammy,_ Dad's voice boomed. _You're dying, kid. You got the ray-bees. I'll be seein' ya soon, pal._

"I...got...ray-bees," panted Sam. His mind trick hadn't worked; the mangy dog bit him...bit him comin' home from school...bit him and...and...

And then our sick pal remembered sumptin:

The flyin' saucer...

_Die Glocke_.

_Die Glocke_ shot his ass down over Saxony. _Sam Pix, POW_. Yep. And...sumptin else...Japs...and balloons...

Fuck if his mind wasn't a jumble of shards. The Nazis were pumping poison in his blood...

Making him harebrained...

Making him-

A voice from the ether, dull in the realm of sleep, muttered instructions.

A brash, caustic voice.

It wasn't Dale...whoever Dale be.

Sam closed his left peeper and dug through blurry pictures stored in his frazzled brainpan. He flipped a dozen headshots, found Blanchard and circled the Colonel's bulldog face with a red marker.

Somehow...

Somehow, the Colonel was tied up next to our pal...

Which didn't make a lick of sense.

What was Blanchard doing in Germany?

Sam tried to crunch the mathematicals...

But his head swam.

He closed both eyes.

Faces from all his glamour shots shuffled...

Jules.

Vera.

Betty Lou.

Walt Pix.

Ma...

Ma's picture spoke to him:

_You're having a dream,_ she cooed. _A bad dream, Sammy. Hush and close your eyes. You won't remember a thing in the morning, honey._

"I won't remember," he wheezed.

Aye, he'd wake in an hour, _humdinged_ , but alone in his bed with extremities free. Whatever he'd gotten into last night (and it must've been potent if he was dreaming of the ugly bastard Blanchard) made him loopy...

***

It wouldn't have been any comfort, but Sam would've had a hard time pronouncing the substance responsible for his condition. However, _loopy_ about described it. He, Colonel Blanchard, Mac Brazel, Jesse Marcel, and two dozen enlisted men of the 509th were varying gradations of loopy. They weren't going to die -not right away- but the bigger problem wasn't the current crop of ill: the future harvest of the Japanese weapon appeared more troublesome.

The Army doctor -brought in with Ishii from Ft. Detrick- nibbled on a thumbnail while studying the row of beds (and the sick cargo strapped into them) behind a dirty picture window. Colonel Murray Sanders was his name. Biological research was his game. Sanders -beanpole thin, mustached, and deficient all but a few willowy strands of his once resplendent black hair- had already seen what Jap depravity wrought. Days after the Pacific War ended, Sanders led a team of investigators into China in what was _touted_ as quest for justice: Uncle Sam tasked Colonel Sanders with cataloging the horrors of the Sino-Japanese conflict...and Sanders obliged. He collected a mountain of evidence, including names of the officers responsible, and sent the information to his superiors in Tokyo.

But justice hadn't been served. And, for whatever galling reason, nobody _ever_ talked about what happened in China. Or Korea. Or _anywhere_ the Empire of Japan decided to treat the local population like _logs_. Worse, one of those monsters managed to make his way to Ft. Detrick, to work alongside Colonel Sanders, as an _esteemed_ contemporary. This was bad enough...but dealing with the debauched Shirō Ishii in Roswell...

In retrospect, Sanders should've recognized what he was walking into. His civilian boss at Detrick, Dr. Edwin Hill, hadn't been a fountain of information. Hill's laconic phone call, arriving seconds after the Missus had shed her panties, was an instant libido killer: _Sorry, Colonel, but you're needed in New Mexico_. The way Hill described it, someone in Roswell had done something rash: _They opened a package meant to stay wrapped._ _No big deal,_ _but we're sending you to handle it._

Beyond this, elaboration ceased. Still, it shouldn't have been a surprise he had been roused to deal with an open package...whatever it be. What of it? Murray Sanders sat at the tippy pyramid top of Detrick's biological researcher hierarchy; handlin' open packages came with the territory.

_By the way_ , Hill added a second before disconnecting, _we're also sending the Jap_. This threw Sanders for a loop; not the kind of loop his soon-to-be patients were in, but enough of a loop to make him a smidge apprehensive about open packages and whatnot.

It didn't help Ishii spoke naught to anyone during the flight.

_Naught_ to Sanders, _naught_ to the thug babysitting him, nada, nothing...

Naught. A. Peep.

The Jap stared out his window the _entire time_. And it was a _long_ trip on the C-45 through the darkness of night. Longer still as the plane weaved around summer thunderstorms and rattled from turbulence.

Ishii's silence vexed; normally, the Nip was a chatterbox. Oh, he loved talking about his repugnant experiments...although... _boasted_ be the better description. Yes, the Jap _boasted_. At Detrick, Sanders avoided rubbing elbows with Ishii. Those days appeared kaput. Hill's dearth of information was disconcerting, and with Ishii tagging along...needless to say, Colonel Murray Sanders developed a negative opinion about the happenings in New Mexico. Worst of all, somewhere over Tennessee (best guess), his acid reflux decided to rain on the parade.

The transport touched down in Ft. Worth for Jet-A and passengers: Brigadier General Ramey and two other subordinates hopped aboard the happy ship without a sound. Wan and uncordial, the General crumpled into a seat and closed eyes. Colonel Sanders considered tempting fate and badgering Cowboy...but he didn't because _knowing one's place in the pecking order_ trumped the need for prescient information.

After landing in Roswell at dawn, Ramey and his posse hustled into a Plymouth while Sanders, Ishii, and the handler scrambled into a jeep. They were whisked to a hanger on the edge of the airfield by a sullen MP who mashed the go pedal without compunction and refused to make eye contact.

Sanders stomach cartwheeled as the jeep came to a jerky stop in front of the gray, three-story concrete structure; four MP's in gas masks, cradling BAR's, stood guard. A drab, olive green sign planted near the sentries read (in fading, yellow letters): _Roswell Resource Center_...but, as Sanders learned in short order, the resource center was now a field hospital because the base hospital wasn't a "secure location".

Three days ago...which meant today was...is... _whatever_...13 July. Time stood still in the RRC. Day, night...it could've been raining toads for all he knew (and even if Sanders knew toads fell from the sky, he would _naught_ have cared).

13 July.

Three days on site.

Enough time for the doxy to work.

One of the ill, Major Pix, stirred and spoke in his sleep; his activity, tho lethargic, portended recovery. But until there was proof _all_ were improving...until then, Sanders would fret, chew fingernails, and curse those responsible for the events what brought him to Roswell.

Most of the enlisted men -young and healthy bucks- escaped a dose of prolonged bed rest. Segregated in a hanger a half-klick yonder, unaware of their close shave with a biological weapon from World War II, they pumped antibiotics, jumped checkers, drank sodas and listened to the radio. The nonsense cover story devised by Cowboy? _Decontamination_ -and isolation from the rest of the world- for _desert mites_.

Now here our Colonel hunkered: entrenched in the hot office, gnawing on digits, watching Captain Kimball -Roswell's Junior Medical Officer- through a pane of glass. Garbed in protective gear, the Captain ambled from one rack to the next, checked vitals, and made notes on a clipboard with a hand enveloped in an oversized glove. Major Comstock -Roswell's SMO- stood next to Sanders and smoked down a Lucky Strike. The perspiring Major torched Strikers like Spencer Tracy, but his quick thinking had mitigated more than a niggling problem.

Arms crossed, Ishii sidled next to Sanders and purred, "How impressive the improvement.

"We got lucky," Sanders pronounced.

"Lucky, yes," Ishii chuckled in a grating, nasally inflection. "Lots of luck. I have to say...eh...despite the circumstance, this presents an excellent opportunity to...eh...conduct valid research."

Major Comstock hacked, fanned the leaden haze and then hacked again.

Sanders spun his head, regarded Ishii with an icy stare and then asked, "You think?"

"Eh...I... _we_...eh...we have a culture to ascertain the morbidity of a crossbred agent two years removed," Ishii explained. "Think...eh...the impact of the pathogen on a variety of ages and physical condition. Yes...a cross-section is necessary for a statistically significant study."

"I have zero desire to revisit this clinical exhibition in the future," Sanders said.

"I'd consider the opportunity," Ishii nagged, poking the glass.

"You can make sense of the numbers on your own time, Doctor. I'm only concerned about returning these men returning from whence _you_ sent them."

Contemplating the scene with a serene expression, Ishii nodded and then said, "You believe I'm a...eh...sadist. Someday will understand science and morality don't work in tandem."

Major Comstock let loose another flurry of coughs...

***

The first hours were a whirlwind of asses-and-elbows.

Major Comstock, bursting of panicky energy, spouted medical gibberish as he briefed the men from Detrick. The medical officer expected more from Washington than a baldheaded doctor and a reedy Oriental. The third member didn't speak a lick and Comstock suspected he represented damage control in the form of muscle. Whatever the case, the goon lingered on the periphery of the conversation, chewed on a ragged cigar, and rubbed his scalp. The menacing wound, like something out of fiction, drew Comstock's nervous peepers.

"They started showing symptoms on Tuesday," Comstock explained to the trio. "By Wednesday morning, we had a couple in the hospital. Captain Kimball paid a house call to Colonel Blanchard after his wife phoned and...and we figured something was cooking, kay? The narrative is, our sick brought a balloon with a basket from the desert on deuces, laid it out in the hanger, and then went on their way. Turns out it wasn't a basket but a capsule with bodies inside. Those involved in opening the capsule caught the brunt of the infection, and quick-like: twenty-four hours and change for the worst-cases. I gave Detrick a call when I realized it was something more potent than the flu."

"The quarantine's your idea?" Sanders asked.

"Blanchard's request, sir. The last coherent thing he said before slipping under. I had to contact the Provost Marshall to hunt everyone down associated with...um..." Comstock trailed off and ran a hand across his slick forehead. Believe you me, Major Jack Comstock had a few questions of his own, beginning with what the hell the Army had been fucking around with in New Mexico...but a speedy side-eye at the disfigured goon (which begged yet another question, by the way) obliterated the desire to pick anybody's brain. Instead, the swampish Major shook the sweat of his hand and continued: "Anyway, I felt it prudent to bring the ill here. I know it's not an antiseptic setting but given the nature of...this...I... _ahem_...I'm making due with limited information at my disposal."

"What are we dealing with?" Sanders asked.

Meant for Ishii, Comstock intercepted the query with a sheepish: "Now, see, I was hoping you could tell me."

"A variant of Tularemia," the Japanese doctor announced all condescending like.

The man with the scar removed his cigar, spit shards of tobacco on the floor and then growled, "What the fuck is _tool-ear-mia_?"

Ishii stared out the grimy observation window and said, "It's bacterium. _Francisella tularensis._ Type A. Normal symptomatic...eh...results...are evident after seventy-two hours, but this is hybridized with Candida albicans. In most instances, the strain becomes...eh... _vigorous_...in less than forty-eight hours after introduction."

"Meningitis," Sanders muttered.

"Mucormycosis?" Comstock squeaked, wide-eyed, as he backed a step from the Oriental.

"Is the fucking thing _contagious_?" our pal with the scar gnashed.

"I've studied the bacterium," Sanders answered. "It can't be spread through contact. Bite...uh...inhalation...absorption through water, but _not_ touch. And Coccidioides, Histoplasma, Candida...whatever the fungi...are inhaled and then disbursed to the nervous system by blood flow. In laymen's terms, not communicable."

"Unless the Butterhead masterminded something to the contrary," grumbled our taciturn goon.

"My efforts were harried by the incompetence of the Kwantung ladder," Ishii bristled, withholding the word _unfortunately_ at the beginning of his sentence. "When applied on the Sino, the mortality rate...I recall it hovered around seven percent, untreated. Termination occurred within ten to twelve days."

Comstock turned to Sanders and whispered, "What does he mean by _applied_?"

In a listless voice, Ishii mused: "Vasculitis, ventriculitis...other than outliers, the fungi appeared to have no effect. Bear in mind, the sample size numbered in the thousands, meaning the results are quantifiable. At risk -the old and adolescent- comprised most fatalities, and _all_ autopsies revealed multiple organ failure hastened by pneumoniac and typhoidal forms of the disease. These men...treat them with antibiotics; streptomycin, doxycycline and...eh...to be proactive, anti-fungal medication."

"I have doxy at the hospital," Comstock said. "But the antimycotics will have to come from Santa Fe. I'll get on the blower post haste."

"You can expect them to feel sluggish for a month, if not longer depending on preexisting health," Ishii said.

"A civilian, Mister Brazel, is the worst case," Comstock said. "According to his wife, he's been ill almost a week. I'm flabbergasted he's still alive."

The goon cocked his head and asked, "What else she say?"

Avoiding direct eye contact with the fella, Comstock shrugged and hawed, "Uhm...Missus Brazel said the Mister -he's a ranch hand- found the balloon doodad in the desert north of Roswell. Before he reported said contraption to the authorities, Mister Brazel took a look-see."

"Where is Missus Brazel?" Sanders asked.

"Out of an abundance of caution, she and her children have been contained in domicile," answered Comstock. "I've also isolated Colonel Blanchard's wife, two military policeman, Sergeant Ragsdale's girlfriend, a local enforcement officer name Wilcox...he visited our x sport the day prior to the recovery effort with Mister Brazel...and a Mister J.B. Foster. They're all in fine fettle, and I don't expect their status to change given the information I received today."

"You've done a bang-up job, Doctor," Sanders said.

"Thanks, but I just realized something," Comstock said, rubbing the bridge of his nose. "Foster runs cattle on the property. His livestock must be euthanized. We can't have ticks or fleas spreading this poison."

"It is impossible to eradicate all vermin," Ishii whispered at the glass.

Major Comstock peeked at the man with the scar; the muscle shoved the cigar into his mouth and resumed champing.

***

Sanders left the control room and walked outside, squinting into the bright sunlight. The bluntness of afternoon bounced off shiny objects; heat radiated from the ground. The MP's, stoic in gas masks, stared into perpetuity. The doc touched toes, lifted arms and rolled his head in vigorous circles; tissue squished and bones cracked. His clothes were ripe, skin clammy, and he hadn't eaten anything but a candy bar since arriving in Roswell.

Behind him, the fire door opened and slammed shut. Casual like, Ishii's handler strolled towards the Colonel; his almost nonstop chewing had whittled the cigar to a thumb-sized nub in his mouth.

"Hiya, doc," the man said, stretching his arms. "How you feeling?"

"Tired. Worn out. Pick a decrepit word and I'm it."

"But you're optimistic?"

"Let's just say, I feel better than when I first got here."

"You look..." _Better_ wasn't an apt adjective and the man shrugged and finished, "...not so peaked."

"I look like shit," Sanders griped. "As far as this mess is concerned...yes, I'm optimistic, but we're not out of the woods. Being said, we'd be in worse shape without the Jap."

"Ain't he a wonder? A real miracle worker."

Exhausted, Sanders misread the sarcasm and said, "Look, I'm far from happy with this situation. Or him. When I return to Detrick, I'm telling Doctor Hill I want _nothing_ to do with your friend. I don't care if I dance the carpet."

"My friend?" the handler boomed. "You can shove those words back into your mouth. That Butterhead is not my friend by _any_ definition you can string together."

"Apologies. I...um...didn't-"

The handler chewed on the cigar and grunted.

"Right," Sanders garbled. " _Ahem_...for context, I followed Ishii's trail of misery through China once upon a time. He and...others...were responsible for-"

"You don't gotta tell me what the Nips were... _are_...capable of," the handler interrupted while fingering his scar.

"Uh-huh...well, I expected to see garbage like Ishii tried as a war criminal. Instead, he's working next to me."

"Yanks your chain, doesn't it?"

"In a manner of speaking."

"Yanks mine. Yanks it _hard_."

"It isn't just Ishii. We're taking planeloads of Germans into Detrick to help with research. _Deal with it or else_ , the brass says. I guess I'll find out what the _or else_ entails, not like I care. But it doesn't matter. None of those men, not even Ishii, are headed anywhere except the lab,"

The handler pulled the cigar out of his mouth, scowled, and then said, "Yeah, I know how it's _supposed_ to work. But I'm telling you, doc, I'm making a special effort to excommunicate the Butterhead. I can deal with the Krauts. This fucker has become a personal mission of mine." He flung the cigar on the ground and pulverized it into the pavement with his foot. Then, with a tight smile, he turned and moseyed into the hanger.

# 12. Ramey's Actions

General Roger Ramey, all six feet four of him, struggled with the restricting biohazard suit. The tagged pieces of the "flying disk" were spread across the concrete floor, bordered by spotlights. Ramey was flanked by the 8th Air Force intelligence officer, Colonel Kalberer, and his personal adjutant, CWO Newton. They watched as the General bent over, scooped rusty eyelets into his glove and shook them like beer nuts. Then he tapped a large slice of crumpled parchment with his boot.

"God...damn," Ramey said, his booming voice reduced to a small crackle through the mask speaker. "Look at this!"

"Yes, sir," Kalberer said. "It's amazing."

"Blanchard said it was in pieces. I didn't realize what he meant. It looks like someone shoved a stick of dynamite up its pooper."

"Meteorological balloons come down all the time," Newton chirped. "Intact, for the most part, but they can disintegrate if the fall commences from high altitude. They start spinning and...you know, shit flies off. Voila: a whirling dervish of parts."

"But two crash sites?" Ramey asked.

"The popular theory from the resident physicist here, Doctor Crary, is the pod broke away first and came down on its own. It would've fallen like a rock. A ring parachute, bundled in a large sack attached to the towline, was found undeployed. A static line appears to connect the chute to an aneroid device. Perhaps it contained an automatic charge to fire below a certain pressure, but it malfunctioned. The balloon, and the hardware you see, floated until it crashed a few miles further."

"Any ideas why?"

"Not sure. Could be a puncture in the balloon. Maybe the...I don't know what to call them, pilots?"

"Why not?"

"Maybe the pilots initiated an emergency descent, vented gas, but lost control. Maybe they had a slow leak, or a bird strike, or lightening contact. It wasn't shot down, not by any of our planes. Your guess is as good as any, General."

Ramey stood, smoothed the crinkly costume, and then said, "I want to see the bodies of these little bastards."

***

The three corpses were mounded on individual gurneys, stripped of clothes and bathed in white light. Their limbs had been broken; arms and legs jutted in unnatural repose. Ramey stared down on them and breathed quick, shallow breaths.

"They look burned up," Ramey declared, at last, in a whisper. He wanted to touch one but forced both hands to remain at his side.

"According to Colonel Blanchard," Newton said, "the vehicle landed intact. They shimmied it onto a deuce and cracked it open here. The crew had to be extracted...you can see force was used. Clothed in heavy coats and jumpsuits; armed with Nambu Type 14 pistols; magazine of eight, full in all three pistols. The stamp on the weapon indicates a 1943 year of production with the Showa affixation."

Ramey studied the heads of the Japs and then pronounced, "They didn't eat a lead lunch."

"No, sir," Newton said. "At or above 18,000...you know how cold it gets. Oxygen tanks were found in the vehicle, but the canned air only provided about twenty-four continuous hours. Doctor Crary reports a high-altitude balloon would take close to a hundred hours to reach the United States from Japan."

Kalberer added: "We're still sorting the nuts and bolts of the operation. At first glance, it appears rather reckless."

"Desperate times," Ramey said. "Expending pilots and airplanes in suicide attacks isn't smart either, but it didn't stop 'em from trying."

"Colonel Sanders believes the crew succumbed from Tularemia," Newton said. "The bacteria...I'm told it's a bacteria...was housed in vials under one of the seats. Sanders also said he'd be surprised if the inside of the capsule hadn't been coated before departure. And even if it wasn't, the crash shattered the containers."

"Gawd almighty," Ramey said. "You got to hand it to the yellow bastards. Who'd have thought of doing something like this?"

"According to the Japanese doctor, they sent nine other balloons with the same instructions. Who knows where they landed?"

" _If_ they landed," Ramey corrected. "The Japs also sent some 9,000 balloons with bombs at us and only a few hundred made it across the pond. I'd say the odds are in our favor they didn't make it."

"Yes, sir, but..."

"I know. All it takes is one of these dirty fuckers," Ramey said. "Hmm...yeah...we need to reevaluate our strategy, gentlemen. Word's going to spread. This flying disk story is causing headaches and the curious are starting to kick the hornets' nest. Time to have a good ole fashioned pow-wow and figure out the best course of action."

***

Ramey was at ease in the confines of the conference room. Unhampered by the protective gear he could stretch legs and strut. He disregarded proper dress for a t-shirt, boxer shorts and a hand towel looped around his neck. A couple bottles of scotch had been procured and drinks were poured by the junior man present, PIO Lt. Haut. The windows were forced open, but the room felt like the inside of an oven. Haut hadn't bothered with ice; it would've melted in minutes. The drinks were poured neat and the five officers sipped while the General patted his face dry.

General Ramey was a Texas boy, born-and-bred, and his nickname "Cowboy" served a dual purpose. He shot guns, raised cattle and had a quick wit impossible to corral. _Contrived_ recklessness, along with a shrewd aptitude to perceive people, made him hard to dislike. Sam Pix, for example, acted out of hedonism without regard for consequence. Roger Ramey knew damn well what he could say, or do, before he mashed toes.

This fiasco in Roswell would put his leadership abilities to the test...but Ramey enjoyed these kinds of challenges. Enlisted at 18, he served as a mess sergeant before acing the officer exams and acquiring an appointment to West Point. While at the cloistered institute he earned repute as a jokester and all-around discipline problem. He rubbed some wrong but the right men saw promise. As a former enlistee (and lowdown on the pecking order as a cook), Ramey knew the bullshit of the Army inside and out. He had zero respect for the pettiness of power tripping officers and his candor earned the respect of those serving under him. Little starch in Ramey's demeanor fashioned levity. Flippancy helped mitigate stress. Problems, he concluded, were best solved when people didn't dwell on the negative effects a decision would have on a career. Of course, this philosophy often created _more_ trouble in the future...but this adversity made the job interesting.

Ramey had encouraged Blanchard to issue the press release about "flying disks" because the little buggers had become the recent rage in the media. The spy balloon tests were a top-secret operation and the Soviets didn't need to catch a sniff. He thought of the disks as a broadcasting fad and assumed the Roswell story would wither after a day or two. In fact, three weeks prior to Roswell, Ramey had issued a press statement debunking flying disks as "friendly" aircraft with "kittenish antics". This came in response to the sighting of nine objects flying at supersonic speed over Mt. Rainier by a private pilot named Kenneth Arnold.

Pure luck granted Arnold a glimpse of the U.S. Army's _Die Glocke_ prototype. And there weren't nine of 'em but three...and they hadn't reached supersonic speeds, either. In a CallAir Model A, puttering at 102 mph, _everything_ (even geese) appeared to move hyper fast. At first, the Army claimed Arnold had seen mirages. But Arnold doubled down, describing the objects in precise detail and then speculating they were "flying wings"...which wasn't a bad explanation, all things considered.

Tongue-in-cheek, Ramey had been accurate in describing the disks as "friendly". In the following weeks, more people claimed sightings of these "flying saucers". A few journalists advanced the laughable theory the objects originated from outer space. The hysteria, Ramey concluded, did an apt job of camouflaging what the disks _really_ were. He even issued strong denials when asked, calling the phenomena "Buck Rodgers stuff". This only seemed to stoke the rumors to a hot fire with chatter of a military coverup...which is what it be, but not in the way Ma and Pa Kettle perceived. So, it could be argued, Ramey's response to the Roswell incident began as a pointed joke as well as a smokescreen. However, this episode was taking on a life of its own...and the poohbahs in D.C. were getting agitated.

Draining his scotch, Ramey walked to a chalkboard and wrote numbers down the left side, starting with 1 and ending with 6. Then he turned and faced the men hunched around the oak table.

"I have a flight to catch..." Ramey began as he squinted at the clock in the back of the room, "...three hours from now. We got big brains, scotch and a room hotter-than-hell so we should be motivated. Mister Haut is from the Public Information Office in Roswell. He issued the statement on 8 July about a flying disk. All right, Haut, let's get to firing."

Haut stood, half-bowed, and said, "Yes, sir. I...I'd like to add...you know, Colonel Blanchard composed the statement. He told me-"

"Yeah, and by magic his hand wrote what I told him," Ramey said. "Nobody's gettin' chewed a new one. This came from me."

"Yes, sir."

"Now, we got to turn this around, son. What's the media been saying?"

Haut consulted his notes, took a drink, and rubbed his neck. "It's become something we'd classify at DINFOS as _an event_ ," he said. "Events aren't a good thing, by the way."

Ramey chuckled and wrote _AN EVENT_ next to the number _1_ on the chalkboard. "Official jargon of public relations," he said, studying the words. "What does DINFOS say about making an event become a non-event?"

"It's not an easy task, sir. I've fielded phone calls from reporters all over the country. Then there are the crazies: today, I took a dozen calls from people who claimed they witnessed our...thing...crash last week. You name it, I've heard it. Wild stories. Fire, explosions...you would've thought a war broke out in the desert based on the descriptions. The caravan of military traffic in the area didn't go unnoticed."

"I think the best approach is to fess up and admit it's a military balloon," Colonel Kalberer said. "Not a spy balloon, of course, but metrological balloons _are_ launched from Alamogordo. They crash, too. And it _was_ a balloon so...make sense, sir?"

"I like half-truths, Alfred," Ramey said with a wink. "Someone's going to have to fall on their sword for the flying disk statement. Sorry, Haut, but you're the sacrificial lamb."

The lieutenant shrank in his chair.

"Don't get gloomy, kid," Ramey soothed. "Look, you're young and ambitious. Nobody's going to fault you for jumping the gun, and this cockup won't impact your career. I'll make sure of it. Be contrite, manufacture crocodile tears and...whatnot. The rest will take care of itself."

"Yes, sir."

"Super. Go with God, my son," Ramey said, making an imaginary cross in the air with the chalk.

"General, we should get this shit pile out of Roswell," Kalberer said.

"Working on the logistics," Ramey said, as he scribbled _MOVE CRAFT_ next to point _2_. "Shit attracts flies. As such, we'll shovel our compost into a suitable commode. The bodies, on the other hand...they're getting a V.I.P. trip to Wright-Patterson. Somebody up the food chain wants to look at those...things. Speaking of, I've come to point three. I'm going to turn the floor over to Colonel Murray Sanders from Fort Detrick's Biological Weapons Program."

Ramey took a seat as Sanders walked to the front of the room. The lack-of-sleep punched him woozy and the scotch hadn't helped; lightheaded, he wobbled next to the chalkboard, blinked eyes and attempted to muster enough saliva to loosen his fuzzy tongue. Hours earlier, as Sanders lazed in a stiff rack and tried to will shuteye, his brain howled: _You're getting Tularemia_ _and_ _the brain fungus_. After some hand twisting, the Colonel dismissed the troubling notion. He'd done everything by the book, or as much of the known book-

"Colonel," Ramey prodded. "Cat got your tongue?"

Sanders manufactured a smile, cleared his throat and then steamrolled: "I arrived on the morning of the tenth and was briefed by Major Jack Comstock, the commanding officer of the base hospital. It's been determined the ill are suffering the effects of Tularemia. My colleague from the WPA is...um...well-versed in-"

"Your colleague doesn't factor into the conversation," Ramey interjected. "You and Major...what's-his-name...tied the bow. Continue."

"Yes, sir. So... _ahem_...Tularemia is a bacterium that enters the body through contaminated dust, animal contact or ingestion, deer flies, mites...you get the picture. As a matter of fact, there are frequent outbreaks of the pathogen in the United States. In clinical speak, the bacteria attacks white blood cells while skirting the immune-"

"I don't want the medical jargon," Ramey said as he poured another scotch. "Give me the poop on our sick, Colonel."

"Yes, sir. The most serious cases are those who helped remove the bodies and inspect the Japanese vehicle. The Tularemia had been concentrated in a powder for disbursement; I believe this powder coated everything inside the craft. It doesn't take but a lungful to catch a dose. Regarding the ill: antibiotics were administered, and the infection has been reversed."

"So, Blanchard, Pix, Marshall-"

" _Marcel_ ," Sanders corrected.

"Uh-huh. Who else?"

"Master Sergeant Kaufman and Sergeant Ragsdale...er, those were the men who opened the craft. It seems pictures were taken; the men posed with the cadavers and-"

"Wha? Christ. They practice their kissing, too?"

"I don't know, sir," Sanders answered in a weary voice. "Colonel Blanchard's the most coherent...but that's not saying much."

"Your report said a local got nipped."

"Correct. A rancher named Macford Brazel. He was the worst of the group. Brazel wasn't at the hanger when the craft was opened, but he poked around the crash site for...best guess, a week. At the behest of Major Comstock, MP's visited his house to collect him on the afternoon of the ninth. Good thing they did. He was in bed with a raging fever. Brazel spiked at a hundred three degrees, but he's stabilized."

"What's the plan with these poor folks?"

"Well, it's like they had a serious case of the flu. We'll drown them in antibiotics and monitor their progress. Twenty-one days from now, perhaps a month, they'll feel human again. I also need to stress: these men are _not_ fit for duty. No exertion, no labor, no driving...good ole R&R."

Ramey swirled his drink and then asked, "You're convinced this isn't contagious?"

"Yes, sir."

"Convince me."

"Brazel was sick well before the military got involved. He'd have spread it to his wife and kids; they'd have carried it and infected others. Roswell is a small town, General. We'd have become aware of an outbreak by now. This doesn't mean we're not taking precautionary measures. As part of the clean-up process, livestock is being destroyed."

"A damn shame," Ramey lamented.

"So you're aware, the livestock is owned by a Mister J.B. Foster. He's not happy about his animals. Since we're talking about stories, we might need to come up with one before he tattles about his cattle. Anthrax would make a good cover."

"Thanks, Colonel," Ramey said. "This brings me to point four." He stood, wrote _COMPLETE SILENCE_ on the board and then said, "Goes without saying, I know, but we have a colleague from the CIG who would like to say a few words."

Loitering in the shadow where two corners of the wall intersected, the spook presented as a disembodied voice; a cigar cherry danced like a pert spark when he spoke: "Telex has been sent to the FBI and the CIG. It would be a Federal crime to speak of this matter outside of proper channels. Failure to adhere to this protocol is grounds for incarceration. Are we clear?"

Five heads nodded in time.

"Everybody's getting the same speech," the spook said. "If you hear someone running their mouth, they are to be reported _at once_."

Again, five heads nodded in time.

"I have nothing else," the spook said.

Ramey gazed at the chalkboard, scratched his head and then said, "I had two other points...guess I've forgotten them... _ahem_...no matter. We've touched the salient themes. I'll draft a memo before I leave. You'll each get a copy. If there's nothing else, let's get out of here. It's too damn hot."

# 13. Recovery

"Major Pix," a distorted voice beckoned.

Sam blinked and opened peepers about a millimeter. Perky light...too bright. He flinched and retreated into darkness.

"Major Pix," the voice repeated.

"It's hot," Sam mumbled. Boy howdy he felt drained. Our hero and his sisters used to pick cotton on Max Thorn's plantation; they could make a nickel per bucket...which amounted to jack and squat, even in the early 1930s. A crummy nickel per...and Sam was one lousy cotton picker. His fingers bled, bugs harassed, and the sun beat the ever-loving shit out of him. A Mississippi heat stroke wasn't worth a nickel per...but there he'd be with the Negros and other poor white trash, picking cotton until he felt...well, until he felt _about_ what he felt like now. To wit: a steaming pile of shit. Sweat seeped through his gown; his brow was slick. When he moved, the sheets squeaked. A rancid smell emanated from under the covers.

"I need you to open your eyes," the voice commanded.

"I'm burning up," Sam whined.

"Open your eyes, Major."

Sam blinked again...squinted...and the world materialized. Two misshapen blobs hovered over him, one on each side of the bed. Piecemeal, their ambiguous shapes assembled into tangible forms. Both wore protective suits, like spacemen from a magazine, and their faces looked tiny behind the faceplate mounted on the soft lids. Sam focused on the man to his left, an Oriental...and boy did he have one impassive melon.

The altered voice to his right asked, "Do you know where you are?"

"A camp," Sam said. He turned his head, winced in pain, and saw the other fella was a Caucasian...which our pal considered be a step in the right direction. And this other fella was smiling...sorta...but a smile be better than stony indifference...except... _what the fuck was going on_? Confused, Sam croaked, "Am I in a Jap camp? How did I get in a Jap camp?"

"Calm down. You're not in a camp. I'm Doctor Sanders, Major Pix. Do you remember anything?"

"Eh..." Sam hawed, glancing at the Oriental. _A Nip_ , his brain reasoned. _But this one be living, thank God. This one be living, unlike those other three. Those three be dead...be found near a balloon...be a balloon in the desert..._

Clarity returned like a snap of fingers: "I'm in Roswell," Sam said.

"Correct."

"And I'm sick...or sumptin."

" _Ahem_...you caught a fever, but it's under control and-"

"I'm roastin', doc. And I stink. I need a shower."

"Be patient. You'll get squared away. For the moment, though, you need to remain in bed. You're not strong enough to be ambulatory."

Our pal appraised the hospital gown and then pronounced, "Lookit this get-up. How long have I been out?"

"A couple of days. Glad to see you're coming around. I'll be back to-"

"Hey, fella...hold on. What'd I get?"

"Get?"

"I'm sick with _what_?"

"You had the flu, Major."

Raising his left arm, Sam saw the iv stuck in bicep and then said, "Must've been a bad case."

"We took precautions. Nothing you couldn't handle, Major. You're almost right as rain."

"Am I?"

"You won't be one-hundred percent for a few weeks. Be mindful of stress and take your medicine. No strenuous fitness and no flying. You'll follow up with Captain Kimball from the base hospital."

"Does this mean I don't have to listen to Morse code anymore?"

"Ha-ha, at least you have your sense of humor, Major."

"I'm not joking."

"For the time being, you're on restricted duty, kay? I'll leave you to-"

"It was them Japs, wasn't it?" Sam asked. He recalled donning gloves, squeezing into the cockpit, yanking out the bodies with Major Marcel. The dead were brittle -like stalks of wheat- and powdery. With each tug, cloudy wisps floated off the corpses in tendrils. They had to snap limbs to fit them out the egress.

A grainy film covered the inside of the capsule. It smelled like mothballs in the pod; yellowed maps and other papers lay scattered on the floor, Japanese symbols decorating the pages. He gathered these, too, and threw them on a table, leaving the mess for the intelligence officer to scrutinize.

The corpses looked prehistoric. Sam tried not to gawk but...the dead presented a terrible sight: mouths agape, eyes dissolved or eaten away...he couldn't believe they'd once been living. Thinking about it now made him want to yak.

Not everyone had been affected: Colonel Blanchard slapped one of the wrinkled bastards across the face. Somebody...an NCO...produced a bottle of whiskey. And then the show got rolling. Getting tight made the situation _tolerable_. Jokes flew...they posed with the dead...celluloid got stained.

Then...then it became a haze. Going home, waking the next day, feeling achy and muddled. Dressing proved an impossible venture. Sam's swollen fingers couldn't fit the buttons through the little holes in his shirt. His hands shook; our old pal sweated something fierce. It be like he was standing on the sun!

Sam was supposed to pay Mac Brazel a visit, get him to keep the lips sealed and whatnot, but he couldn't find his car keys. A _long_ time of futile searching gave way to lethargy. Our hero collapsed on his bed; later, he tried to contact the Colonel on the blower, but his secretary said hisself was ill. This raised naught a bit of suspicion in Sam's addled mind. All he wanted was sleep. _Lots_ of sleep...

So, he sunk into serenity and dreamt of Jules. And wouldn't you know? She came for him; she came dressed in a strange, bunchy suit with a helmet where her head should've been. Jules rolled him onto a stretcher while he pawed at her face. _Save me,_ he croaked, as bright light gave birth to ambiguity...

"It was them Japs," Sam declared, boring holes into Sanders faceplate.

"Rest up, Major," Sanders said through a phony smile. "We'll get chow and a shower in short order."

***

The soup, tomato in name, had the tang of what Sam assessed be like molten lead. But it was sustenance and he felt stronger after lapping the slop with a plastic spoon. An orderly pulled the drape from around his bed like a shower curtain, opening the view from the cot. Sam was surprised to see the roomy expanse of a hanger spread before him. Giant fans had been set in the center, their extension cords snaking into blackness, but he couldn't feel the generated wind. And when he looked up, the steel circulators in the rafters stood motionless. No wonder he was burning up.

There were other beds to either side, some with curtains pulled, some concealed. To his left, Colonel Blanchard sat propped against pillows, flipping through a newspaper. After some noisy paper ruffling, the Colonel peeked at Sam over the top of the sports page and asked, "How you feeling, Major?"

"Hot."

"This place wasn't built for comfort. But I have to say, these guys got their shit squared away."

"Which guys?"

Blanchard shrugged, which said more than a wordy explanation...not like one was going to be offered.

Yeah, Sam knew the score: "The tough shit crew," he mumbled.

"Huh?"

"Forget it. Who else is here?"

Blanchard pointed at the closed curtain to Sam's right: "Major Marcel's next to you. Brazel's next to him. There were a couple NCO's, but they were discharged earlier."

Sam rubbed his chin, felt stubble, and then said, "Oh...yeah...one of 'em brought whiskey. Master Sergeant...or sumptin."

"Kaufman."

"It's those bodies, ain't it? The Nips. Fuckers were radioactive or something."

"The official story is we got the flu."

"Yeah, I heard. But I _know_ it-"

"Then we had a bad hangover."

"Uh-huh. Worst humdinger ever. You going along with this version of events?"

Blanchard shook the paper, licked his tongue, and flipped the page.

"I'll take it as a _yes_."

"Major, someone will come see you and...eh...this guy isn't much of talker, but he has sharp advice. If you're wise, you'll listen."

"I can read between the lines. Nobody has to threaten me."

"Just pleasant guidance," Blanchard said, as he turned another page. "Hey...would you look at this? I've been down four days and Ted Williams raised his average three points. What a player, doncha think?"

Sam grimaced and crossed arms.

***

With a clinking of metal hooks, Marcel's curtain was opened an hour later. Sam looked at him and whistled: Marcel looked like he'd lost a few pounds from a frame already stretched thin.

Marcel tittered, "That good, huh?"

"Eh...no worse than the rest of us," Sam answered with tact.

"Looks like..." Marcel said, as his eyes appraised the surroundings. "Looks like we're in a hanger."

"Best I can figure."

"Uh-huh. They got us the fuck away from everyone."

"You seen the doc? He's wearing some kinda protection outfit."

"They don't want what we're selling."

Sam touched his nose.

"But...I guess we're out of the woods," Marcel said.

"Did you see the Nip? Wonder what his story is."

"What Nip?"

"Yella fellow in one of those suits was at my bedside when I crawled outta the stupor. Didn't say a word. Creepy fucker just stared at me."

"Beats me."

"Creepy fucker," Sam said, under his breath.

"Who else got the royal treatment?" Marcel asked, swinging his head left and right.

"Blanchard left an hour ago. Got up, said he was done lounging, and walked out. Brazel's next to you. I ain't seen hide-nor-hair of him, although they keep checkin' on him. I'm fixin' to do like Blanchard."

"I feel like I got run over by a deuce."

"I felt like I got run over by a Sherman, but it passed once I ate. You'll freshen up."

Marcel looked at his arms, tugged on the IV, and stared at the bottle of fluid. "I had the worst dreams," he confessed in a murmur. "They're dimming now, but I remember some of it."

Sam closed his eyes and recalled his hallucinations. They were fading, too, but the vivid moments remained. It was a hodgepodge of war scenes, shot from a jumpy camera, "Sam's World At War" footage in black-and-white. Benny, Foo Fighters, Dawber the bombardier and...

"Dale," Sam whispered.

"Huh?"

"Somebody named Dale. I kept thinkin' about him. Damn if I can't put a face to the name."

Marcel leaned forward and asked, "Dale?"

"Yep. Dale. Shit, I must've met the guy years ago."

"No, you didn't. You met him in the hanger."

"The hanger? He one of those enlisted grunt hossing parts?"

"Don't you remember?"

"I couldn't remember how to pee four hours ago."

"Dale... _Dale Palmer_. D.P. The name on the canvas. Scratched into the surface."

Sam's mouth dropped.

"Yeah, we puzzled over it for a good ten minutes," Marcel said.

"What'd we figure?"

"I guess you don't remember. Blanchard theorized Palmer was one of the laborers. _D.P._ Make sense?"

Nodding, Sam shut his mouth. It made sense...and the sense made him shudder.

"Say, who do I have to yell at to get some chow?"

Laying back, Sam muttered, "You'll get soup." Then he filed Dale Palmer's name into the back of his mind.

***

The orderly who delivered Major Marcel's soup assisted Sam to the shower...which happened to be a single spigot spun into corroded tile tucked in a spiderwebbed niche. There was no curtain, but Sam wasn't concerned about privacy. Under the feeble glow of a recessed lightbulb, he dropped the sticky gown, pulled the metal string and stood like a statue. Tepid, gritty water dribbled from the showerhead...but Sam didn't care about this, either. His disgusting aroma, just a hair north of bad cheese, and the filth covering his body spiraled down the drain with a slurp. For good measure, Sam chased the funk with a long, banana colored stream of piss.

The orderly gave him generic field trousers and shirt, absent insignia. After he dressed, Sam was shepherded into a small room and told to take a seat beside a table. Left alone, he twiddled thumbs, and thought about what Blanchard said: _a fella with sharp advice...you'd be wise to listen._

Or words to the effect.

At last, the door swung open. The intelligence folks _all_ looked the same: four-eyed eggheads with pale, doughy faces...like they never saw the sun or sumptin. Pencil pushers, in other words. But the man who entered...Sam did the ole comedic double take. This guy...big, bald, wearing a Senators jacket, carrying a folder and chewing on a ratty cigar...had a vicious scar decorating his scalp. And his face be knotted in anger, pain, or constipation...perhaps all the above.

Dropping into a chair across from Sam, the fella said, "Glad to see you up-and-about, Major Pix." There wasn't a hint of compassion in his scratchy tone. "I've been keeping an eye on you," Scarhead continued, tossing the folder on the table with a _thwack._ "You were in bad shape when you arrived."

"Yea...I...caught the flu...or sumptin."

"Not, _or something_."

"Right. A bad case of the flu."

Scarhead grunted, opened the folder, shook out a dozen papers, and fanned them in front of Sam. "I'm with the Central Intelligence Group," he said. "I'm here to make sure-"

"We can skip the bullshit," Sam interrupted. "Colonel Blanchard said I'd get a talking to."

"Good," Scarhead rumbled. He slid a sheet across the table with a fingertip and said, "You can read it. Or, if you're a man of your word, we can _skip the bullshit_."

"I'm not much of a reader. I reckon it's just a bunch of government mumbo-jumbo."

The goon smiled and produced a pen from his coat pocket. Then he clicked it and rolled it across the table.

"All of 'em?" Sam asked.

"Scribble away, Major."

Head down, Sam inked his mark while Scarhead chewed on the cigar. When he was finished, Sam arranged the papers into a tidy pile.

"Wonderful," Scarhead said. "For the record, it was a weather balloon, in case you're wondering."

"I'm not, but I'll take your word."

After sliding the papers into the folder, Scarhead stood, nodded, and then walked to the door.

"Hey, bud," Sam called, "since I doubt we'll cross paths again, I have to ask: the scar?"

Hand on the doorknob, the man stopped and presented Sam with his profile. "You know," he said, "I hope we don't meet again because...welp, I'd be disappointed if we did. So would you. Anyway, I got the scar from _not_ signing...in a manner of speaking. Jap camp. Sandakan. Nasty bastards. I had information they wanted. And they wanted it _bad_. Guess what? They never got it. So, your experience here is _nothing_ but a jaunt in the park from my shoes. I'm not bragging. I'm telling it like it is. The Nips had me so twisted, I _wanted_ to die. I would've died, but I had a companion who got me through the worst. Guided me from the dark to the light. Made me strong through it all. Gave me a reason to continue living."

Sam had heard identical God chatter from Ma long ago, and our pal did naught want to entertain a lengthy sermon. "Hey, to each their own," he said all congenial like, raising hands. "I'm not a devotee of the Lord, but if-"

"The Lord?" Scarhead cried. "Naw, you got me pegged wrong, Major. I'm not one those nuts."

"Shit, I coulda sworn...um...forget it. I got you five by five."

"The Lord can go about saving others. I'm driven by retribution." He touched the wound, smiled and then concluded, "This scar reminds me I have plenty to accomplish. The score isn't close to being settled. In the meantime, I handle shit like this...which might seem pedestrian but...eh...here's the deal: if anyone had reason to talk, it was me. I didn't, and I _don't_ have sympathy for those who do. Bottom line? Keep your mouth shut."

"Mum's the word," our pal said, chasing the words with a throaty hack.

# 14. Furthermore

Men wearing protective gear bundled the remains of the Jap craft into five large wooden cargo boxes. The three wrinkled bodies were stuffed into black body bags and then dumped into individual coffins. By the way, these coffins were transported to the base by a Roswell mortician named Glenn Dennis.

The phone call stirred Dennis hours before sunrise on the morning of 13 July. It wasn't unusual to receive requests at odd hours; death was anything but convenient. However, the woman on the other end, a nurse from the Roswell Base Hospital named Naomi Maria Selff, asked Dennis to supply "three child-sized boxes". The special request struck the mortician as odd; forty-two years later, during an interview for a book on the Roswell story, Dennis expounded on his diminutive role in the cover-up: he claimed the caskets were for "autopsied aliens". How did he know? Nurse Selff confessed the information when he delivered the caskets.

Furthermore, Selff died in an airplane crash weeks after the mysterious episode at the airfield.

Or so the story went.

And other people connected to the Roswell Incident, so-called, met the Grim Reaper at a premature age: Colonel Blanchard, heart attack, age 50; Roger Ramey, heart attack, age 59; Mac Brazel, heart attack, age 64; Sam Pix, suicide, age 38...

While others lived to ripe old ages: Jess Marcel, age 79; J.B. Foster, age 85; Master Sergeant Frank Kaufmann, age 90; Walter Haut, age 83.

People see what they want to see, and they fabricate stories where none exist. The UFO hype surrounding Roswell in the intervening years has made it profitable to provide compelling narratives or invent hokum. Whatcha call a cottage industry; Glenn Dennis became one, in a long line of individuals, who tried to make a buck off a manmade muddle.

This story you're reading...nutin but a big ole bunch of b and s.

Except this story be true.

Anyway, what happened in Roswell wouldn't be discussed today had the military been forthright.

But they weren't. The U.S. military, another cottage industry working out of The Big House, or The Puzzle Palace, or Fort Fumble...also known as The Pentagon...spun stories because...well, all them mofo's are adept liars, too.

A Boeing C-97 Stratofreighter flown in from Carswell AAF, Ft. Worth, touched down in Roswell at 1645 on 13 July; General Ramey supervised the loading process with agitation. He had to arrive in Texas by 2000 local because the brass wanted the bodies in Dayton before midnight. The big dogs in Washington were woofing and Ramey wanted to throw them a bone.

After they landed at Carswell, the cargo was unloaded and transported to a non-descript hanger on the western edge of the field. A cluster of intelligence officers from the Pentagon were waiting and they photographed the objects for posterity. Meanwhile, Ramey watched the C-97 blastoff for Wright-Paterson from his staff car. Besides the pilots and load master, the plane carried three coffins for the two-and-a-half-hour flight to Ohio. Then, Ramey went home confident the business be kaput.

Or so he thought.

The next morning, his phone rang before the alarm clock. His wife moaned in her sleep as he fumbled for the receiver and then mumbled a subdued, "Hello?"

"It's Hoyt," General Vanderberg barked from his office in the Pentagon.

Ramey rubbed his temple, felt a headache start to kick, and then said, "Call me in an hour."

"I need you on a secure line," Vanderberg instructed.

"I've been on the go-"

"I need you on a secure line."

"Now?"

"Two minutes ago."

"Shit...give me five minutes," Ramey said, before hanging up. Twenty minutes later, dressed in a bathrobe and fuzzy slippers, he stood in the garage with a cup of coffee. Ramey was one of the few Americans with separate phone lines at his home, but Wifey and Kiddies didn't know this dirty secret. The _significant_ blower, installed behind his tool bench (nestled between a sander and a steel Park toolbox), was the only apparatus in the garage Roger Ramey handled. He dialed Vanderberg's number and then pawed through the meager toolbox as the phone trilled.

A wrench...a pliers...a washer-

"What the hell, Roger?" Vanderberg asked, sounding exhausted. "Five minutes?"

Correction: two washers-

"I have a powwow in fifteen," continued Vanderberg, "and I need to meet with Vannever before I run the gauntlet. Besides the doctor, the others..."

A hammer...a screwdriver...damnit, I'm tired...

"...put in order, from the same book. You follow?"

Ramey shut the toolbox cover, snapped the metal fasteners, one at a time. _Click._

"Roger, you there?" nagged Vanderberg.

_Click._ "I'm here," Ramey answered. "And I follow."

"Do you? Because I'm trying to arrange my talking points and...and the _one_ thought I keep circling around, and this isn't admiration in my voice, Roger, when I say: you've out cowboyed yourself this time."

"Maybe...but the situation's been handled. Carswell's housing the debris, the bodies are in Ohio and...eh...they are, aren't they?"

"Affirm. Arrived last night."

"Thank Christ."

"Uh-huh. But tell me...how do you _always_ seem to fashion a noose with the rope you're handed?"

"Jesus, Hoyt," Ramey groused. "I flew to Roswell and took care of _it_. At personal risk, might I add. We have men and a civilian socked away with the Jap's version of 'Dulce Et Decorum Es'. Not to mention the enlisted personnel from the 509th we had to sequester. It could've been worse."

_Or, it could've been better_ , Ramey's mind proclaimed...but the voice of hindsight never bothered to speak during crisis. Well, cookies crumble the way they do. Be the mystery of the cookie.

After Blanchard's call on 7 July, Ramey contacted the Pentagon looking for guidance. Of course, nobody knew what the fuck to do. Vanderberg, the Acting Army Air Force Chief of Staff, fretted like an old lady picking out a hat for church. He told Ramey to "take care of it". And he had...but Vanderberg wasn't pleased with the results.

"You should've been on site from the moment, not waiting for the shit to hit the fan," Vanderberg said. "I can't make sense of this fiasco. We've conflicting press releases. It's a disk...it's not a disk. The PIO from Roswell is sticking his foot in mouth. How old is the kid? He looks twelve. The press is digging. If word of these bodies gets out...look, can you appreciate the situation I'm in?"

"Ditto."

"Ditto?"

"I did the best I-"

"No, you fucked around and played games. And it backfired. Now people are seeing flying disks _everywhere_. Cincinnati-"

"They were seeing 'em before Roswell-"

"-Gettysburg, Mobile-"

"Hoyt, we can't talk over each other and expect-"

"Get your ass in front of the media and piss out this fire!" Vanderberg exclaimed.

"There isn't a manual for this kind of thing. And if there is, why don't you fly out to Fort Worth and show me the page where an emergency procedure for a crashed Jap biological weapon from World War fucking Two is located."

"It could've been handled better."

"In hindsight, I _might_ have done things different. I take full responsibility for the flying disk story. I told Blanchard what to say. The notion...look, we were preventing the Reds from...forget it, Hoyt. My fault. It'll be rectified."

"Blanchard, huh? He's one of the sick, correct?"

"Yep."

"Status?"

"I passed the details to Twining yesterday evening, after I arrived home."

"Nate's not giving the briefing today. I am. I need intel straight from the horse's mouth or, in this case, the other end."

"Gee, thanks."

"Anytime. What's Blanchard's prognosis."

"According to the doctor from Detrick, he'll be fine. But Willy's always been a high-strung bastard so...the diagnosis is a matter of opinion."

"Are you _trying_ to be funny?"

"He'll be _fine_."

"And the rest?"

"I think they'll be fine."

"You think?"

"They'll be _fine_. Everyone's gonna be _fine_. Except me...I need sleep, Hoyt. Are we done?"

"The worry is people will talk."

"Yep, they will. It's impossible to keep secrets. We had a CIG goon flown in to help with damage control but...stories are going to float. But let me ask: isn't a flying disk story better than the truth? Any idiot believing in spacemen sounds...well, they sound like an idiot, don't they?"

"Not another word about disks _or_ spacemen. Period."

"Let me make sure I understand: you're saying I _can't_ tell the press about the Tularemia?"

"What? No!"

Ramey laughed.

"This isn't a joke," Vanderberg fussed. "The President's been briefed. He's worried about a pandemic. He also wants to know if more of these balloons are waiting to be found."

"The short answer is yes. The long one...what can I say? We won't know until we find them. They're like Easter eggs. Once you crack 'em open, you hope the inside isn't gooey."

"We're going to start canvassing the southwest with flights."

"You been to New Mexico, Hoyt? There's a lot of desert to cover, never mind the higher elevations. Shit is hard to see from the air. Odds are this doesn't happen again. If it does, we'll have a better handle. By the way, the Jap doc, Ishii...he told us ten balloons we're launched like the one found in Roswell."

"Do you believe him?"

"Mm...yes. He sounded disappointed there weren't more. In any case, I'd say the other nine are cozy at the bottom of the Pacific. For the sake of argument, let's pretend they are."

"You need to get in front and take charge," Vanderberg concluded. "Keep me briefed. I don't like getting my ass chewed for what I discover in the newspapers."

"Understood."

Vanderberg hung up and Ramey regarded the phone in his hand. The President, huh? Bow howdy, the Big Time! If Vanderberg wanted Ramey to handle damage control, so be it. He felt his time could be better spent...but this wasn't a hill he was willing to die on.

***

Vanderberg briefed the other military chiefs at the morning meeting in the Pentagon's Leadership Conference Room. Present were Navy CNO Admiral Nimitz, Army Chief-of-Staff Eisenhower, Secretary for the Commander-in-Chief Leahy, and Undersecretary of War Royall. Dr. Vannever Bush, he of the Office of Science Research and Development, also graced the chamber with his pinched-faced presence.

Besides General Vanderberg, only Dr. Bush knew the scope of the mess in Roswell, and he was also acquainted with the Japanese Fu-Go operation during World War II. When word spread something strange had been discovered in New Mexico, Dr. Bush _suggested_ the source be an old enemy. His insight, however, stopped there. Nobody expected a biological attack and even Bush raised an eyebrow in surprise when the extent of the situation filtered to the select few (three men, including the President) in Washington.

This meant Vanderberg had to drop a couple of bombs...and he'd have to parse words with diplomatic efficiency. General Eisenhower was being groomed for politics and Vanderberg wanted to appear smart and competent; his future might hinge on the handling of this matter.

"I spoke to General Ramey this morning and he's cognizant of how delicate this situation is," Vanderberg began after everyone settled into chairs.

"It's not a flying disk?" Eisenhower asked.

"No."

"But the press thinks it is?"

"Yes. Due to some sloppy information given by the Roswell Public Information Officer, the initial story credited a flying disk as the culprit of the debris. Ramey's working to rectify this misinformation. It'll be presented as a weather balloon, along with verifiable, photographic proof."

"But...but it's not a balloon?" Eisenhower asked, knotting brow.

"Well...it is, but it's not one of ours."

"Russian?"

Vanderberg looked at Dr. Bush. Dressed in a blue shirt and red tie, Bush's thin, creased face -framed by wire rim glasses- appeared more wan than normal. His greased hair, slicked to the left side of his head, glistened under the overhead lights.

The doctor took the cue from Vanderberg and said, "It's not Russian. It's Japanese."

"Japanese!" Nimitz exclaimed.

"Yes, Admiral. Launched a couple months before the end of the war. It's been sitting in the desert for two years waiting to be found. Lucky for us, it crashed in an uninhabited area."

"Hot damn," Nimitz whispered.

"Part in parcel of a larger operation the Japs used to attack our country. The Germans had the buzz bombs, the Japs used balloons."

Nimitz chuckled. Like Sam Pix, his head conjured an image of passive birthday balloons filling the sky.

"It's not a bad idea," Bush said. "They made use of the winds and the available resources at their disposal."

"We're covering up a Jap balloon," Nimitz pronounced through a grin. "Great. I don't see what the big deal is."

"The big deal is, this balloon carried a biological weapon," Bush answered. "A biological what sickened men and livestock. In a populated area the results would've been dreadful."

Nimitz's smile slackened and he sat up in his chair.

Bush nodded and said: "The first phase of their balloons, Operation Fu-Go they called it, carried bombs. Now, we don't know how many balloons were sent because the man in charge of the program killed himself before we could get hands on. Documents suggest about 9,000. Since 1943, 300 have been found in North America, some as far north as Alaska. One balloon managed to kill a handful of people. _One._ Once we got wise to the assault, the Army kept a better eye on the skies. Many Fu-Go were shot down or followed until they crashed. In addition, bombing sorties targeted Japanese hydrogen plants, all but rendering the program useless. The press was never told because...you can understand, we didn't want to create a panic, and we didn't want the Japanese to know any of their Fu-Go made it to the United States.

"Nonetheless, I'd wager there are hundreds scattered around the continent waiting to be discovered. What we've found outside Roswell is their second, and final, creation. Operation Butterfly, according to intelligence. Piloted balloons with biological weapons. The crews were supposed to land and disperse a bacterium."

"Now you understand the need for secrecy," Vanderberg said. "We had a mild contamination resulting in illness but no deaths. Three bodies, the crew, were recovered from the crash site. They're being disposed of and now we shut the book, okay? The story of a weather balloon is our refrain. We need work from the same sheet of music."

"How can we keep this a secret, Hoyt?" Eisenhower asked, glancing around the table. "How many soldiers have touched, seen...talked about it?"

"I hope to discredit the worst of the rumors through persistent avowals."

"Gentlemen," Bush said, "the military managed to keep a lid on the Japanese balloon efforts during the war. We can do the same with this."

Eisenhower didn't agree. Things had changed; the press played a greater role in American culture and information circulated through mass media. Unlike his colleagues, the General found this fact-of-life tolerable. He'd visited the death camps in Germany and marveled at the hypothetical ignorance of the Germans living next to those camps. And he recognized the dangers of a press controlled by the government. If the Nazis taught mankind anything, it was the power of manipulation. The Third Reich mastered the art of the whitewash and the degree to which its citizens believed reality. The result: an awfulness Eisenhower wouldn't forget, and he feared the U.S. could verge down this path. And it never ended with lies. What happened when fabrications were discovered? The answer: more lies to cover the original deceit. Where did it end, if ever?

What trust would citizens have in the government?

"Penny for your thoughts, General?" Bush asked. "I can see you're deep in thought."

"I...I can't help but ponder something I read a few years ago," Eisenhower said. "Take it for what it's worth, but I find the words apropos." He cleared his throat and then recited, _"A government valuing secrets more than the lives of its citizens is a tyranny."_

"Oh, come now," Bush sneered. "We're not talking about Sacco and Vanzetti. This is national security."

"Relax, Dwight, it's been nipped," Vanderberg enjoined.

"If you ask me," Nimitz said, "we should drop another atom bomb on them yellow bastards for this inconvenience."

There was a smattering of laughter.

"Doctor Bush, can you provide a little more information about the biological?" Undersecretary Royall asked.

Bush said: "Experts from the chemical warfare department at Detrick assisted. They identified the agent as Tularemia. The Japanese used it in China and concluded the bacteria was an adequate, and cheap, weapon. Due to the quick action of our doctors, nobody perished."

"This ought to be the story," Eisenhower said. "Sharp doctors saving lives, our soldiers risking their butts in the name of national security...why try to hide it?"

"We pinched it," Bush said, "because we had a Japanese doctor assist. I can only disclose he had operational knowledge. I can't go into specifics."

"Oh, for crying out loud," muttered Nimitz. "What kinda operational knowledge did he have?"

"Sorry, but this information is top secret. For the record, he's been a great help."

"Sure, a _great_ help" Nimitz mocked. "One of those pardoned bastards, eh?"

"You know I can't answer," Bush bristled. "And it doesn't matter what _any_ of you feel. The Japanese are ex-adversaries. They, and the Germans, have no love of the Soviets. We're working on the same side. Get used to it."

Vandenberg decided to get a rub in on the Admiral, who sounded pious with indignation. "Chester, if I recall, you testified on behalf of Dönitz at Nuremberg."

"Apples to oranges," Nimitz said. "The Kriegsmarine engaged in the same type of unrestricted submarine warfare-"

"U-boats sunk passenger ships," Vanderberg argued.

"Yeah, well, so did a lot of our subs. Mistakes happen. And the reason I testified... _ahem_...branding Dönitz a war criminal makes all of us war criminals. Kind of a dangerous precedent if we're ever on the losing side, don't you think?"

Eisenhower sighed.

Nimitz rumbled, "You have something cute to add, Dwight?"

"This is a pointless argument," Eisenhower said in exasperation. "Karl Dönitz is an extension of a government built upon genocide. Service record aside, he _is_ a war criminal. You didn't see me testifying on behalf of Keitel or Jodl. The uniform doesn't excuse malice, Chester. We have a duty to-"

"This isn't the time to reconcile personal misgivings about war," Bush interrupted.

"Agreed," Vanderberg said. "This line of discussion is never ending; my apologies for bringing it to the table. If there are no more questions about what's been discussed this morning, I propose to end this meeting and...

# 15. Tumbleweeds

"A little R-and-R, eh, cap'n?" Leslie Wright asked.

"Gonna work on my tan," Sam answered as he stared into his beer. He had no desire to do such damage, but the answer sounded trite enough.

"Wonderin' where you were the last week. You know there's this talk about flying saucers and things falling from space? Not asteroids, cap'n. Freaky things. Makes me nervous."

"It's nothing, Les," Sam mumbled.

"You in the know?"

_You bet your ass!_ Sam's brain answer. But his mouth garbled, "One of them...you know...weather observation balloons shit the bed. People are blowing things out of proportion."

"Yeah?

"Yep."

"Uh...no offense, cap'n, but I don't know what to trust. First the paper says flying disk, then it says balloon. You gotta admit it makes for contrary speculation."

Sam looked beyond Leslie's left shoulder and saw Gus at the bar, swirling his beer, within earshot of their conversation. Our pal had never been ultra-distrustful before (just a _mite_ distrustful, and a mite distrustful is a long way from _full-blown, yank yer hair from the scalp_ distrustful) but...well, our ole pal's radar be spinning like an anemometer in a hurricane.

He wouldn't put it past the military to plant a dupe in his path. And, as he eyeballed Gus Cramer, Sam Pix reached another conclusion: he'd be spending less time at the Weed. Indeed, he pictured a future of solitary saucing at his base house. The walls wouldn't tattle... _or_ would they?

See, from the moment Uncle Sam kicked our ole pal's infected ass out the hanger, our ole pal grappled with them icky good-for-nothing sentiments: _Paranoia_ ; _Distrust_...

The Big Bad Wolf.

Be stoopid noodle calisthenics... _or_ was it stoopid?

Maybe people _were_ eavesdropping on our ole pal.

The speculation drove Sam batty.

"I ain't seen Julie in...jeez...over a week," Les jawed. "Her old man found the thing, right? Whadda think of _that_?"

"I think you need to read the rag," Sam answered. He leaned over the bar and grabbed the _Roswell Daily Record_ sitting atop the beer cooler. Sunday edition, 14 July, four days old, but the date wasn't important. Sam smacked the paper in front of Leslie and then pointed at the headline: General Ramey Says Disk Is Weather Balloon; underneath, in reduced type: _Lt. Haut reports object used to determine direction and velocity of high-altitude winds_ ; a third bullet in even smaller print (so small, Sam almost needed a magnifying glass to read): William Blanchard, commanding officer of the Roswell Army Air Field, left here today for a three weeks' vacation in Santa Fe and Colorado.

"I read it," Leslie said, pushing the newspaper aside. "I also read how Mac is sorry he told the military what he found."

Sam grunted and went back to his beer.

"Of course," added Les, "Mac's always had a big mouth."

_Or, what's-his-name has gone off the deep end,_ Sam thought. Days after his discharge from the hanger slash hospital, the dumb bastard had given an interview to the Roswell newspaper. _What's-his-name_ claimed he hadn't found a weather balloon but _what's-his-name_ wouldn't elaborate...which was prolly the reason _what's-his-name_ hadn't disappeared into thin air. Nevertheless, _what's-his-name's_ final quote oozed with malice: " _If I find anything else besides a bomb, they are going to have a hard time getting me to say anything about it."_

"Anyway," Leslie said, raising his mug, "glad you're back, cap'n."

"Uh-huh," Sam said, waving a dismissive hand.

_Back_ , but for how long? Blanchard had given him twenty-one days of leave upon discharge from the "hospital" and said their deal was pat provided Sam kept his yapper shut. _Take three weeks, rest, and let me know where you want to go,_ Blanchard instructed. _I'll fast track the orders and you'll never see Roswell again._ Like magic, Sam would be out of New Mexico sometime in August. Major Marcel had already split like he passed gas. Off to D.C., to become an adjutant in intelligence or some shit. _Job at the Pentagon,_ Marcel bragged. Sam warned him to watch out for Vera Pederson.

As for Sam...the idea of going to Nevada and test flying still appealed. Or it did until the phone call he received the previous evening. "Brooklyn" Benny Green had rung, out-of-the-blue, and Sam marveled at the timing. He hadn't talked to Benny since...it'd been at least six months...and then all-of-a-sudden...

"Just thinking 'bout my old buddy," Green said. "All this news about flying saucers down your way? Reminds me of the thing we saw over Germany."

All stoic like, Sam replied: "What thing?"

" _What thing?_ Sure, Sam. _What thing,_ he-he. But, um, like I said...the buzz in Roswell? What's the lowdown?"

"Weather balloon."

"Weather balloon?"

"You heard me."

"The paper here said it's a vehicle with bodies inside. And markings on the wreckage bearing the initials _D.P_."

Surprised, Sam cawed, "How did..." before regaining composer and snapping: "How would I know what the stoopid rag in Vegas said!"

"Oy vey. I'm just asking. Don't bite my head off."

"Rumors, Benny. Nothing to 'em."

"If you say so. Hey, I heard through the grapevine you're out of the doghouse. You coming to Nevada? We're flying some wicked contraptions. You ought to see the hardware."

"Who told you?"

"Call it another rumor. You know how the scuttlebutt machine operates."

Sam did but the call seemed stilted. Perhaps Benny was calling to check up. _Prolly_...curious. He _prolly_ wasn't goading Sam to spill the beans. _Prolly_ a coincidence. But why did Sam's gut tell him different? Like Walt Pix always slurred: _"Co-wink-e-dink be a fancy word for a bad luck."_

***

For once he didn't close The Tumbleweed. Three beers and Leslie's badgering drove him home before another episode of Fred's veneration of the "Splendid Splinter". He sat shirtless on the back patio, feet propped on an ice chest. The lawn chair leaned back until Sam's head rested against the side of the stucco house. A bottle of Old Jordan burrowed into the crook of his crotch. He sipped and studied the cosmos; sipped until limbs felt useless and his head slouched forward. Balanced like an angel on the head of pin, our tight pal almost toppled when the front door rattled.

_The Big Bad Wolf!_ his sodden mind cried.

He flashbacked to the morning visit from Marcel weeks prior. Way back when, day infringed on dark and he had been semi-coherent. Now, starlight sky; he, groggy. But the same thought nagged: _Who be huffing and puffing_?

_The Big Bad Wolf_ , his humdinged mind confirmed as he wrenched open the door.

But it wasn't _The Wolf_. No, it was a welcome, seductive caller: Jules, looking demure and anxious. She twisted the purse strings in her hands as her cherry lips formed a smile. His heart palpitated; he struggled to maintain a straight face. He wanted to jump on her, rip off her pleated powder blue dress and get to the black lacy undergarments.

Instead, he returned her smile, invited her in, and took pleasure in watching her face flush. He mumbled an apology for being topless and waved the greasy bottle in his right hand as if it explained the situation. Then he left her in the living to fetch a shirt. When he returned, she was sitting on the couch, smoothing her dress.

"You want a drink?" he asked.

She wrinkled her nose and said, "No."

"Sure? Plenty to go around."

"I didn't come to drink."

_Play it cool,_ his mind tutored. Thus, he wandered into the kitchen, found a clean glass in the cupboard (one of two), and poured three fingers worth of brown juice.

"I-I told the sentry I'm a friend and we have business," she called.

He inched around the partition, raised eyebrows and said, "The guard's no dumdum. Pretty girl, this time of night... _business_."

Another wrinkling of nose and a curt, "All men think alike."

"Woman ain't different."

"I don't know about other women, but I'm not making a social call. It's Mac."

" _What's-his-name?"_ he asked in disbelief. "You came here to talk about _what's-his-name_?"

"Sam, he's a paranoid. He thinks people are watching him; he won't go to work; he won't even step out of the bedroom. I don't know what to do or who to talk to. I know you were with him in the hospital and-"

"Oh yeah? He tell you?"

"He hasn't told me _anything_ , but I know."

"Do you?"

"Soldiers dragged him out of our house!"

"He wasn't the only one."

"Why?"

"We caught a bug. Sumptin in the desert. But, look, nobody died, the-"

"A bug?"

"The flu or sumptin."

"It wasn't the flu. I have children. I know what the flu does."

Our pal resorted to his S.I. response: "Have you read the rag?"

"The paper?"

"What more do you want me to say? Everything's in the newspaper."

"I want _you_ to tell me what happened so I can figure out how to deal with my husband."

"Ha! All the sudden you're the model wife?"

Jules held her hands up like they each contained a weight. "Wife," she said, lowering her left hand. Then she raised her right one and said, "You."

"I might be drunk, but you got it backwards, doll."

"My life is with my family. You were a...a distraction."

"Wonderful," he said, before draining two fingers and then adding three more. Hands shaking, the neck of the bottle clanged against the lip of the glass. _Am I angry or still sick,_ he wondered.

"Tell me I wasn't the same."

"The same?"

"A distraction."

"Why? So your guilt is absolved?"

"So we can have a conversation without feeling awkward. I can't go into the Tumbleweed knowing you're there and..." she rubbed her head, sighed, and then whispered, "...and I don't want you thinking about me, Sam."

"Done. I'm not going back there anyway. Too much Fred and Les and Gus-"

"Gus? Gus never says anything."

Sam set the Jordan on the kitchen table and said, "The rules have been carved into stone: I'm not going back to the Weed. Out of sight, right? Now, how about you leave me alone. I wanna get humdinged."

"But-"

"I don't want to see you, Jules."

"Fine," she said, rising from the sofa. "Fine. I didn't come to bicker. I came as a friend."

"A _friend?_ You came as a _friend_ to ask me about _what's-his-name_? Well, let me tell you 'bout _what's-his-name_ : _What's-his-name_ found a weather balloon; _what's-his-name_ got the flu; _what's-his-name_ spouted off to the _Daily Record_ ; _what's-his-name_ should've known better. _Ahem_...dat's what I know 'bout the situation." Our pal drank the booze down and then leaned against the wall behind him. "Yee-ep," Sam said, smacking lip. "Yee-ep...and...oh...one other thing: if _what's-his-name_ is wise, he'll make like a clam. Then _what's-his-name_ will have nutin to worry about."

"I see. It's a big secret."

"A secret like you and me," he said with a wink. "A secret 'cept with one _big_ difference: if _what's-his-name_ doesn't watch hisself, _what's-his-name_ will go to jail." He thought about adding _"or worse"_ to the end of the sentence; instead, he decided to refill his cup.

"Jail? For what?"

"T.S. military stuff. _Shh._ Hush-hush. You need to keep _what's-his-name's_ lips-"

"It's an Army disease, isn't it?" she blurted. "What kind _blah blah blah_? Are my children _blah blah blah_? Will Mac ever _blah blah blah_? _Blah blah blah_..."

Sam swirled his bourbon, blinked eyes, breathed deep.

How could he lie to her?

How could he not?

How could he reside in a world of half-truths without going nuts?

_By gettin' humdinged,_ Walt Pix's gruff voice intoned. _And what did I say about women, Sammy? They be spiders. They be clever at trappin' ya in their-_

"Enough," he growled, cutting off her stoopid line of questioning. "I'm tired of thinkin' 'bout Tough Shit b and s. You wanna talk 'bout sumptin? Let's talk 'bout them dead fellas from the Eighth, _good fellas_ , not a sauced-up fella like your ole pal. Let's talk a bombardier I flew with. He...he got jerked to another bird after ours got shot up by a...a Kraut jet. Twenty-sumptin year old fella by the name of Cecil Dawber. He took flak in the snotbox...in the kisser...in his station on the _Lady Of Layfette_ a week before V-E day. _Lady_ landed with a big ole hole and Cecil..." Sam raised his glass, toasted ether, and pronounced, "Cecil looked like ground meat. Let's talk 'bout dat, Jules."

She touched his arm and said, "Maybe you shouldn't drink so much."

He shrugged...and then decided to pursue another strategy: squinty-eyed and sneaky like, our pal asked: "Say, you aren't a spook, are you?"

Flinching, removing her hand, backing away, she cried: "A spook?"

"Yee-ep. A guver-mint spook. You're tryin-ah get me to talk!"

"No-"

"Yes, you are! Uh-huh. _Acting_ like you care about _what's his name_...you're tryin-ah trick me!"

"Why-"

"I'm on to you, Jules. You're...you're clever, but I'm on to you."

She pressed her lips together...right eyelid twitched...and then Jules bolted for the door, opened it, and slammed it against the wall. Seconds later, the Nash turned over and peeled from the driveway.

"Good rid-dince," our pal slurred.

It's easy to get rid of dames, harder to forget them...and it's damn near impossible when they leave a lush scent in their hasty wake. Like a dog, Sam sniffed the aroma and followed her trail outside. Beneath a star spackled sky, he weaved down the street with a glass of Old Jordan until Jules perfume merged with hi-test.

# 16. Lincoln LaPaz

July fused into a blur of _humdingers_.

The diurnal pattern of summer weather -the locals called 'em _monsoons_ \- spawned thunderstorms he could set his watch too, ifin he was wearing one. Sam watched the clouds bloom in the early afternoon while he sizzled on the patio, ice chest o' beer at his side, until they were plump with moisture. The storms in Mississippi were of the frontal variety; warm Gulf air clashing with cold air from the north produced powerful squall lines capable of generating tornados. In New Mexico, the thunderstorms were the runty offspring of warm, turbulent air masses or orographic lifting provided by the Sacramento Mountains. This meant tornadoes were rare and Sam lolled as the storms matured, confident in his safety. And if he wasn't safe and sound? What of it? Our ole pal wasn't living forever.

Leave afforded Sam a never-ending daisy chain of days like this. He'd planned on doing work around the house, but these tasks died with a whimper, drowned in booze and indifference. Time became one mind bending haze after another in which he drank more than he thought possible. The pills the doctors passed out for whatever infested him...as General McAuliffe said at the Bulge, _"Nuts!"_ There didn't _appear_ any linger side-effects anyway. Other than the _humdinger_ headaches, he felt spic-and-span.

Doctor Kimball, he of the Base Hospital, seemed to agree.

Mostly...

"Your blood pressure is high," the doctor observed.

"Does this mean I gotta compose my last will and testament?"

"Not yet, Major."

"How soon then?"

"You in a hurry?" Kimball asked, as he removed the blood pressure cuff from Sam's left bicep. "If you are, the drinking will speed the process."

"I didn't think it would slow it."

"Uh-huh. Welp, you're on the right track at the rate you're going. I can smell sour mash oozing from your skin."

"Hell, Doc, it's hot. I sweat everything out of me."

"You want some good old-fashioned doctoring advice?"

"Not if you're gonna tell me to quit boozing."

"Then I'll save my breath."

"What's it matter anyway? Who knows what poison I got crawling through me after what I breathed in the Jap capsule."

Kimball looped the stethoscope around his neck and then asked, "You think the flu is going to kill you?"

"Sure," Sam said with a chuckle. "The _flu_. Was the Jap doc studying the flu?"

"Nobody else is sick. Those guys in the 509th are fine."

"Yeah? How many of them were laid up in quarantine? I haven't seen Colonel Blanchard in a while. How's the old man holding out?"

"The Colonel's on leave, like you. Take your antibiotics, as instructed, and you'll have no need to worry."

"Easier said than done. I'd worry less if I knew what made me sick."

"The flu, sir. You can get dressed now. I'm through with the examination."

"Yeah, I get it," Sam bellyached, as slipped the t-shirt over his head. "And just so you know, I don't blame you."

"Blame me?"

"Blame you for having the temerity to lie to my face."

"Sir-"

"Because mums the word. _Shh_. Tough shit, right? I met the fella with the scar-"

" _Ahem,"_ Kimball interrupted. "We're done, Major."

"Met him same as you," Sam droned. "The big bad wolf. Big bad wolf says, let me in, little pig, _he-he_."

The doc cocked his head, listened to Major Pix giggle like a schoolgirl, and then said, "Sir, you should consider reducing your intake. It's not good for the ticker or the mind."

***

Despite assurances to the contrary, Sam gave into temptation and rolled into the Weed a week, or maybe it was two, after his self-imposed banishment. Why? Fuck all be why. Did he need a reason? But _if_ there be a reason (and, mind you, there wasn't), he felt bad the way he left things with Jules. Maybits he owed her an apology...and maybits the apology be disguised as an excuse to see her again.

What of it?

And, maybits...well, _no_ maybits about it: Sam was tired of drinking alone, tired of staring at clouds and thinking of the straight razor. In fact, he avoided his bathroom like it housed malevolence instead of a dirty commode. A patchy beard grew on his cheeks and chin (what Walt Pix used to call a _summer beard_ because _sum beard be here and sum beard be there_ ). He didn't shower and pissed outside or in the kitchen sink. When he had to make numbers 2 or 3 (not often because he wasn't eatin' nutin), he drove to the PX. The civilians working there were prolly starting to talk but...nuts to them.

It be a scorching Wednesday, the last day of July 1947, when he burst into the Weed with a hankering to get loaded.

Fred almost jumped the bar. "Sam!" he hailed. "Jeez O'Pete! I thoughts you fell off the Earth."

"I'm on leave, Fred. I can't be showing my face at this dump every day. People'll start to think I have a problem."

"Leave, huh? Did ya go anywhere nice?"

"You bet," Sam said, as he took a stool. "Lookit my tan. You don't think I'd sit around my place and stare at the sun."

"Where'd you go?"

"Oh, you know, a little here, a little..." Sam trailed off, glanced left, then right. The place was empty; gloomy. A yellow Astor Mickey behind the bar broadcast Hank Williams twangy voice infused with the crackle of static. The Weed at eleven in the morn appeared more depressing than a seat next to Hitler in hell...but after a few beers the dump would feel homey.

"Say," Fred said, as he set a frosty mug across from Sam. He had _the_ look in his eye, the look he was about to spring another of his ridiculous Ted Williams monologues. But-cha ya know what? Sam didn't care. He gripped the handle of the stein, tilted it and thought, _bring it on, big guy. Chat away. Tell me about Teddy this and Teddy that._ _Yes, sir! Boy howdy! Ted's the cat's meow! Please do tell and then do tell some more._ The first splash of draught plopped on his tongue and then rolled into his gullet. Yep, all be fine and dandy. Nothing could bring Sam down, not Hank Williams mournful, love had turned to hate, twiddle and twang. _Zilch._

Fred leaned on his right elbow and said, all quiet-like, "Say, this fellow came in looking for you the other night."

Sam looked over the top of the mug; a curl of chill rose from the glass. He coughed and set it down with a thump. A swell of beer slopped over the top and splashed on the bar.

"First he asked for Julie," Fred continued. "After he was through talking to her...well, then he asked about you."

"Who?"

"I don't know. I tolds him you hadn't been around. You know, maybe it wasn't the other night. Five...six days ago, I guess. Sometimes I can't remember what month it is, _he-he_. Getting old is no-"

"What he want?"

"Shit, we didn't shoot the breeze, Sam. Talk to Julie. She gets here around two, after the day laborers punch out."

"Was he bald? He have a big ole scar running over his head?" Sam asked, tracing a shaky finger from left to right ear and mussing his mop in the process.

"Naw, this guy has hair. And a mustache. Never seen him before. My age, give or take. He gave me a phone number but I threw it away. I got enough junk as it is. Besides, I figured he'd find you if he hung around here long enough."

"He wasn't wearing a Senator's jacket?"

"Senators? Who the hell likes the Senators? They could lose 100 games this year. Ossie Bluege might be the worst manager ever!"

"I knew a fella who...never mind. It's prolly not him."

Fred grabbed the mug, topped it off and then said, "On the house, Sam. Good to see you, pal."

***

Julie strolled through the door at ten after two, about the time Sam poured the tepid remnants of beer number eight down his throat. He had been musing, so to speak, for the last one hundred ninety minutes as Fred bent his ear and the radio emitted an endless stream of high and lonesome ballads. Every so often he'd nod at the bartender and add sumptin trite, but the Fred's words were vibrations lacking import. They could've come from one of those Mogul balloons as far as Sam was concerned. Fred didn't notice; Fred be happy yapping.

She slowed a step and shot daggers at him...but then quickened her pace and disappeared into the back. As the Weed filled with noisy ranch hands and migrants, she went to work while he drank another. And then another. An hour passed; Les and John and Butch meandered in -one at a time, in this order- took stools near Sam, and engaged in small talk. He watched her in the distorted mirror, but she never looked his way.

In the interim, Les yapped about some stoopid, deranged Navy rite of passage called an _equatorial baptism_ ; details of said initiation included beatings, drenching with fire hoses, and "poop-chute tickling" with sumptin called the "Devil's Tongue" (a device Sam reckoned resembled a cattle prod).

At 1600, Sam decided to shit or get off the pot, otherwise he'd be too humdinged to attempt a civil conversation with her. He watched Jules mosey to the kitchen, exhaled...

"...and then you have the Order of Purple Porpoises," droned Les, "which is when you cross the Equator _and_ the Date Line on the Vernal Equinox. And let me tell you, this is rarified air, but a lot of sailors mistake the Order for The Golden Shellback and-"

"I gotta visit the w.c.," Sam interrupted.

"Yea, yea," Les said. Then he turned to Butch and continued, "...and those guys..."

Sam pushed open the swinging doors and found her alone, back to him, working her hair into a ponytail. He placed a hand on her left shoulder, squeezed, felt her stiffen-

"I thought you weren't coming here anymore," she said, shaking free from his grasp.

"Change of plans. Jules-"

Back to him, she crossed arms and spat, "What?"

"I want to apologize for the way we left it."

She swiveled, scowled, and then hissed, "You mean how _you_ left it."

"We, you, us."

"Don't play your stupid word tricks, Sam Pix. I came to you for help and you...I don't know if you were playing a game or what, but you scared me."

"Yeah, about that. Look, I'm sorry. I'm just...I'm a little screwy right now."

She blew air out her mouth and a strand of blond hair above her forehead fluttered.

"How's Mac?" he asked, trying to keep her engaged.

"You want to talk about Mac?"

"No...but...I mean...he's better, right?"

"Mac is...he's working again, at least, but not at J.B.'s. Something happened to the Foster head, Mac said. He's helping Henry Ojeda build a porch."

"Good."

"Still won't talk to me. Sleeps in the living room with the shotgun. Does this sound good?"

"Er...he'll...he'll get better."

"Are you better?"

"I will be as soon as I get outta Dodge.

"What do you mean?" she asked, shifting her weight.

"I'm fixin' for reassignment. Nevada, maybe, but I haven't decided."

"You haven't decided? The Army lets you pick?"

"In a matter of speaking."

"I didn't know it worked this way."

"Most of the time it doesn't but, lucky me, I caught the break of a lifetime."

"When are you going?"

"Next week, next month, I'm not sure. I gotta talk to the fella who pulls them strings. Anyway, I don't want to leave it frosty between us, okay? I'm sorry for acting nutty. Like I said, I'm not thinking straight right now."

"You drink too much, Sam. More than anyone I've ever seen."

He rubbed his neck and mumbled, "I'm gonna handle it."

"I hope you do."

"Bowing out of Roswell will-"

She threw her arms around him, hugged him so tight the breath left his lungs, and whispered in his ear, "You have a place in my heart; you'll have a place there forever."

"Or until one of those greasy ranch hands bats their doe eyes."

"Jeez," she snorted, pulling away from him with tears in her eyes. "Always with the smart mouth."

"Heh. You know me."

"Yes, I do. And I like you, Sam Pix. If things were different-"

"Stop. Don't go there. I like this ending better than the one where we heave clichés."

"You're right," she sniffled, before dabbing her cheeks with the apron wrapped around her waist. Then, she smoothed the garment, dug her hands into the pockets and declared, "There, I'm better."

"Good."

"I need to get back...oh..." she inhaled while fixing him with a mortified look.

"What's wrong?"

Out of her pocket came a slip a paper, folded in half, held between fingers of her right hand. "I forgot about this, Sam. I-I didn't think I'd see you again so-"

"Forgot about _what_?"

"A guy came in a week ago looking for me, but he wanted..."

Sam forgot, too. He forgot Fred mentioned this factoid five hours prior cuz because: beer begets amnesia; Fred gabbed; Les arrived; Johnny sat down; Butch told a dirty joke; Gus stared into oblivion; Jules bounced in; he flexed nerves to approach her...but there it be, Fred's tinny words, echoing in his head as Jules moved her mouth: _'Say, this fellow came in looking for you the other night'._

"...talk to you," Jules said. "Do you want it?"

"Um...want what?"

"His number?"

"Who?"

"Lincoln LaPaz."

"Sorry," he chuckled. "My mind's wandering. Can you give the long and short again?"

"He...Lincoln...came in a week ago looking for me. I-"

"For you?"

"Well...kinda. He wants to talk to Mac, but we've had people phoning our house since the story about the flying disk, or whatever, came out. Nuisance calls. Reporters and the curious. Mac doesn't want to speak to anyone. He unplugged the phone, tossed it in the shed. This Lincoln LaPaz figured out I worked here and cornered me."

"Cornered? What do you mean _cornered_?"

"It wasn't...like I said, he wanted to talk to Mac and I told him _too bad_. Then he asked some question but I told him I don't know anything."

"Questions about what happened with Mac?"

"Mm-hmm. He wanted to hear Mac's version of what was found at Foster's."

"Is he a reporter?"

"No...he said he's a teacher at the University of New Mexico. An astronomer, I think."

"Uh-huh. I bet he's lying."

"Whatever the case, I told him he should ask the Army, but he laughed. He hasn't been back since."

"Fred said he asked for me."

"Well...I gave him your name."

" _Ugh_ ," Sam groaned. "Why?"

"I don't know. He was insistent."

"Wonderful."

"Hear me out, Sam. He said he used to be in the Army and the-"

Fred poked his head through the door and banged on the wall. "Hey, hon," he said, "we got orders backing up. A lot of thirsty fellas are getting thirstier."

"I'm coming," she answered. Then to Sam she whispered: "He gave me his number in case I ran into you, but I didn't-"

"You didn't think you'd see me," finished Sam.

"Do you want it? If not, into the garbage it goes."

He glanced at the slip...and then plucked it from her fingers. If nutin else, he'd call ole Lincoln LaPaz and tell him to mind his business.

The rest of the evening our old pal slipped the paper in-and-out of his pocket, opening and closing, eyeing the blocky name _LINCOLN LAPAZ_ and the phone number beneath. He did the same with Jules, watching her bounce from table-to-table. They'd made peace, he felt better, and now came time to banish herself to the storm cellar in his mind. And with her, he realized, the stoopid slip should go. He couldn't tangle with Mr. LaPaz. Reporters were sneaky; he'd get Sam to confess something or twist his words. _If_ Colonel Blanchard stayed true to his word, _then_ Sam's stretch in Roswell be nigh.

If...then...

But _if_ Sam rocked the boat, even by mistake... _then_...

So, he shoved the number and Jules into the vault -jammed 'em in with everything else- closed the door and locked it. Easy peasy. _Latch, snap and click_. Then he pictured himself standing on the banks of the Mississippi, winding up and tossing the key as far as he could. It flew in the air, turning and twinkling, almost to Arkansas...before disappearing with a splash in the dirty brown water. Sam wiped his hands. There, all done. And he didn't consider, not for a second, this be stoopid _wishful thinking_.

The door stayed closed until he arrived home and found the key. It hadn't sunk far, just a fathom in the swill. It wasn't a thought of Julie (although, in the future, a whiff of her brand of perfume or the backside of a blond-haired woman in a pleated dress would set him off). He removed his shirt, emptied pockets...and his fingers closed over the paper; he held it in his right palm, squeezed hand, felt fingernails dig into skin. Then he uncurled fingers, one at a time, like a spider straightening legs. The paper opened like a flower until the number appeared in full bloom.

Sam studied digits, then he glanced at his watch. Half-past midnight...Lincoln LaPaz should be sleeping. If he were like Sam, though, he'd be awake. Drunk and sleepless. Or maybe LaPaz was like a smitten woman, sitting sentry, pining for a call.

_You don't know who he is or what he wants,_ Brain argued.

For good measure, Scarhead added his opinion: _Take it from me. It's better not to talk._

And then our pal shredded the paper into confetti and watched the pieces float into the trash can.

***

Days later, he was back at the Weed: not quite noon, slouching at the far end of the bar (the darkest nook in the joint, tucked into a corner), working on another hangover, humming to the radio. Hank Williams sounded happier. He was gettin' some by the sounds of it. His girl be movin' on over and Williams be movin' in.

The door opened, bathing the room in sobering sunlight, and a stranger walked in. He took a stool near the middle of the bar, ordered a beer from Fred, glanced at Sam, and then returned to the drink.

When Fred ambled back, Sam pushed the mug at him and dug into the bowl of beer nuts.

"You see the feller over there," Fred said, as he yanked the booze stick.

"Hard to miss him."

"He's the one asking 'bout you."

"About me?"

"Remember? I tolds you about it. First Julie, then you."

"Oh yeah?" Sam trilled, uncurling his posture.

"I've been meaning to ask," Fred said, all sneaky like, as he handed Sam a fresh one. "Are you and her...you know..."

"Me and her?"

"Hey, I don't cares none. Peoples business is their business. But this feller...he strikes me as private eye."

Sam tossed a couple nuts into his mouth, blinked peepers, eyeballed the fella (also known as Lincoln LaPaz), and then shrugged. Mood lighting turned LaPaz into a dusky shadow.

" _Remember pup, before you whine,"_ Hank Williams crooned. _"That side's yours and this side's mine..."_

_Crunch. Crunch._ Sip. Swallow.

"You betters watch yourself, Sammy," whispered Fred. "He looks like the Continental Op. Or what I pictures the-"

"Fuck you babbling about?" Sam interrupted.

"The Op. He's a gumshoe."

"What kinda name is Continental Op?"

"It's not his real name. The Op's always in disguises, you know? Ain't you read Hammett?"

Crunch. Crunch.

"... _over cold dog cause a hot dog's moving in..."_

"Could be he's keeping tabs on you," Fred pronounced.

After exercising his jaw, Sam said, "He's a reporter."

"A reporter? You thinks?"

"Second thing, Fred: they're ain't nutin between me and Julie. This fella is trying to dig dirt about the weather balloon Mac found."

"Oh...oh, I forgets about the balloon. Gee, and heres I'm thinking..."

Fred vomited a half-assed apology Sam acknowledged with a grunt. Meantime, LaPaz consulted a notebook, an itty bitty one of the pocket variety...like a nosy, scrounging, reporter would carry.

The little angel on Sam's right shoulder lectured, _stay put and forget LaPaz_. And Sam was a sheet, at best two, not the usual three or more required to instigate an argument. But the little devil on the left blade...the little devil didn't say anything. The little devil just snapped its fingers- _snappity-snap-_ and Sam decided to nip this thing, whomever or whatever it be. Gawker, goon, gumshoe, gossiper...it didn't matter. He stood, smoothed his shirt and walked the bar, sliding his beer with him over the countertop. Arm's length distance, Sam stopped, _sorta_ wobbled, and cleared his throat. Lincoln LaPaz dropped the notebook, rotated on the squeaky stool...

"Howdy, friend," Sam said through a phony smile. "Don't think we've met."

"Pardon?" LaPaz asked, crossing arms. Squeaky voice and a face to match: couple chins, Gable-like stache, wan.

"I've heard you been bothering people."

"Bothering? No, mister, I haven't bothered anyone."

"Not what a little birdy cheeped," Sam said, jabbing a finger into LaPaz's doughy left arm.

To his credit, LaPaz didn't shrink. He pushed Sam's hand away and said, "Look, I don't want trouble, but the next time you touch me I'm gonna break your hand."

"You don't want trouble? Then you shouldn't waltz into a strange place and bother the help."

"Huh?"

"The waitress. I heard you cornered her."

"Missus Brazel?"

"Her."

"Sure, I talked to her, but your information is wrong, pal. We had a civil conversation, nothing else."

"Nothing else is right. Quit bothering people and quit comin' in here. Finish your drink and am-scray."

"Last I checked it's still a free country, mister...I didn't catch your name."

"My name's not important. You're warned." Sam considered jabbing LaPaz again, but decided getting into a fight and busting the shmucks beak would lead to one of those unpleasant _if/then_ situations. Instead, he drained his beer and then thumped the empty glass on the bar.

"Mister, I'm not going to be told who I can have a-"

From behind Fred called out, "Sam, you want another?" Discounting the stoopidity of the question, the timing couldn't have been worse. Sam winced and dropped an oath under breath.

LaPaz squinted, stroked his mustache and then asked, "Major Pix? Sam Pix?"

"Fella, I've said my piece," Sam squawked. "I'm not-"

"You are, aren't you? I want to talk to you, Major.

"Do you got cotton in your ears? I just told you to quit botherin' people!"

"Hey, calm down. A minute of your time. Sixty seconds, and then I'm out of here. Square deal?"

"No, _not_ square. I know how you reporters-"

"Major, I'm not a journalist. I'm an astronomer at UNM, and I have a theory about the object found on Foster's Ranch."

"Good for you, but it's a weather balloon. Nutin else."

LaPaz's tongue flicked out of his mouth and licked lips. He looked eager but said, in a hushed voice: "I'm not with the government. If you're worried I'm going talk to the wrong person, I won't. I'm not imprudent. I know how things work."

"Yeah? If you knew _how things worked_ , you wouldn't be asking questions."

"There's where you wrong, Major. I'm here because I know _how_ things work. I used to be in the military and I...here, take a seat. Like I said, sixty seconds. You don't have to answer, but I'm curious to know if I'm on the right track." He had a hypnotic way of talking, soothing and self-assured. Sam slid onto the stool with no idea he did so until his ass hit the padding. "By the way," LaPaz said, "I'm Lincoln-"

"LaPaz. I know who you are."

"Right. You came at me guns blazing, Major. Who'd you talk to? Missus Brazel or the mister jerking beers?"

"They both mentioned you were fishing."

"I had a longer conversation with Missus Brazel. But I wasn't hunting her. I wanted to speak with her husband."

"You best leave them alone. Mac's a high-strung fella. Sleeps with a shotgun."

"Are you and Mac friends?"

"Eh...along those lines."

"So, did he call you about this object or...how did everything come together?"

"You're assuming I know sumptin about it."

" _Ahem_...Major, I'm _well_ past making assumptions. Missus Brazel mentioned you were part of the detail sent to Foster Ranch. You and...I forget who else."

"See, you're slick," Sam said, pointing a finger. "You're trying to trick me."

"No, I'm not. Honest. The morning of 7 July, you arrived at J.B. Foster's home with a couple military policemen and another...well, this _is_ an assumption, but I doubt it's incorrect...another officer. Or...did I get bad cheese? Is Missus Brazel lying?"

"No...no, she's not lying. But I couldn't tell you the name of the MP's. And the other fella...he's long gone."

"Major Jesse Marcel?"

"Jeez," Sam scoffed. "If you have the answers, why are you pestering me?"

"It's a guess, _was_ a guess, but Major Marcel posed with those pieces of foil. The picture ran in the newspaper. And there were quotes from him. It's only natural to assume Major Marcel has, or had, direct knowledge."

"He's not dead."

"I never said as much. But he's gone, right? Transferred? Change of MOS?"

"Sumptin sweeter than Roswell."

"Which of you two ran the operation?"

"We didn't run nutin. Simple S and R of a weather balloon. Happens all the time. This one got blown out of proportion and now the crazies are coming out of the woodwork. No offense."

"I'm not a crazy, Major."

"I'd say stalking isn't the best way to prove the point."

"Maybe, but the only things I've ever stalked are balloons."

Sam stifled a cough as Fred arrived with a new beer. LaPaz ordered a second round and they sat in silence. Now Sam caressed curiosity... _the only things I've ever stalked are balloons..._

At last, LaPaz asked, "How long have you been in the Army?"

"Long enough to know when to keep my mouth shut."

"We're just chatting, Major."

"Like a couple swell fellas over a few cold ones? I ain't you're friend, Mister LaPaz."

"I never said you had to be my friend."

" _Humph,"_ Sam grumbled.

"Old Maid Boogie" popped from the Astor. Sam drank. LaPaz closed his notebook with a snap, hummed to the music...

For no _good_ reason, Sam cleared his throat and then said, "Little over eleven."

"Long time. Air Corps?"

"After boot camp."

"You were a pilot going in?"

"My father flew and I learned from him. I did survey in the FSA before enlisting."

"Major in eleven? Not bad."

"The war helped."

"Pacific?"

"Europe."

"The 509th saw action in the Pacific Theater."

"I'm not in the 509th."

"Hmm...how'd you find your way to Roswell?"

"Astronomy, huh?" Sam asked, changing the subject.

"Pardon?"

"You're an astronomer? I assumed b and s."

"No bullshit. My full title is Department Head of Math and Astronomy Studies."

"Heh. Bet you're a hit at parties."

"I am at the parties I go to. How'd you end up in Roswell?"

"Are you sure you aren't a reporter?"

LaPaz adjusted his rear and then pulled a wallet from his back pocket. After some digging, he extracted an id card and handed it to Sam. The black and white matched the real face, and the words matched the claim: _Professor, University of New Mexico, Math & Sciences_. Sam returned the card and LaPaz asked, "Satisfied?"

"Look, I don't know what you _think_ happened, but we hauled a weather balloon out of Foster's Ranch."

"Oh, I have no doubt you found a balloon. Um-hmm. But I don't believe it's a weather balloon. I could be wrong; I _do_ have an active imagination. But I'm familiar with Operation Fu-Go and my gut tells me the balloon...well, need I say more?"

Sam sniggered...but his stomach filled with butterflies. There be sumptin else, tho: an admiration for LaPaz's refreshing bluntness. The chubby professor hauled some big stones.

"You're going to tell me Fu-Go doesn't exist," LaPaz declared. "Or you've never heard of it. Or the Japanese didn't send thousands of balloons across the Pacific during the war, right?"

"Yeaaa," Sam drawled. "I _could_ say one of those three things."

"But?" LaPaz asked, leaning forward.

" _But_ I'm wondering how you came about your information."

"Direct experience."

"Did you find one of the bastards in your backyard?"

"Don't I wish! No, once upon a time, I was the director of analysis in the Second Air Force technical department. I studied them. Mapped them. _Attempted_ to calculate where they'd land. We never had any success, but their balloons weren't a success, either. After the war, I did a little digging. Turns out the Japanese estimates of the jet stream were a hair off. They calculated a flight time of around 70 hours, with a charge set to destroy the balloon when it hit this limitation. In reality, it takes close to 100 hours to cross the Pacific...if you're in the stratosphere, I mean. Regardless, more than a handful crossed the pond. And more than a handful is more than enough to make the military nervous. Some sharp fellows analyzed ballast carried by the balloons, dirt for the most part, and discovered sediment and organism's native to the saltwater bordering the Shizuoka Prefecture. Presto."

"You know, fella, I appreciate your candor. However, a word of advice: you should temper what you say and who you say it to."

"Oh, the balloons aren't a big secret, Major. Convince me I'm not revealing anything you don't already know."

"Shoot, you can blame my MOS for what I do _and_ do not know. My point is, Nip balloons aren't a normal topic of conversation at The Tumbleweed."

"What's your MOS?"

"My MOS is Tough Shit," Sam said through a smile.

"Fair enough, but secrets have a way of getting out. This so-called weather balloon Mac Brazel found? You should hear the rumors from here to Albuquerque. Flying saucers, spacemen...diseases from outer space. Convoys of military vehicles transporting debris from the desert. Such fantastic tales created by an ordinary weather balloon, wouldn't you say? Of course, the Army didn't help with their first press release. Whose bright idea was it to say a flying disk crashed?"

Our hero waved an indifferent hand and muttered: "You're trying to trick me again."

"Hmm..." LaPaz mused, drumming fingers on the bar. " _Ahem_...I'm positive it's a Jap balloon."

"You're entitled to believe what you want, even if it's wrong."

"Why the peculiar stories?"

"There was some...whatchacallit...uncertainty."

"Do you expect me to believe you guys couldn't tell the difference between a weather balloon and a flying disk?"

"We're green."

"Sure, and trickery's a mistake."

"What can I say? Somebody up the chain has a sense of humor. Don't ask me what they were, or are, thinking. The bottom line, Mister LaPaz: even if it weren't a weather balloon, I couldn't tell you anyway."

"They pushed the same bullshit on us with Fu-Go. Silence or else. Makes we wonder what kind of nation we're becoming."

"Same nation we've always been. And...um...sumptin else you should consider: when we collected the mess, there were two dozen others beside me. If it wasn't a weather balloon, somebody would've talked."

"Mac Brazel started to run his mouth. Now he's a mute. Those others...most of them are enlisted. How many know _all_ the details?"

"What details?"

"The stories of a quarantine?"

Sam yawned and then said, "Standard procedure in a case like this."

"What was on the balloon? Is the Army testing radiation or something biological?"

"I've said enough, Mister LaPaz. You can accept the military's version, or you can theorize. What you can't do is harass Julie Brazel. She doesn't know anything."

"Fair enough."

"Nice talking to you," Sam said, as he slid off the stool. "Next round's on-"

"Hold on," LaPaz interjected. "Since you flew in Europe, I'd like to bounce a thought off you."

Our pal raised an eyebrow.

"I've seen some peculiar things in the sky," LaPaz said.

"Yeah? Like what?"

"A flying disk. Beginning of July, after sundown, near Fort Sumner: a single, white, oblong shape moving with great speed. Up, down, left, right...wild, drastic maneuvers. It wasn't Jupitar or Venus or an optical illusion. There were clouds and they provided a...a background for this glowing object. I observed a fantastic display of a novel airborne device before it disappeared into thin air. Spectacular. I'm still in awe thinking of it today."

"So...I'm confused. You _do_ believe in spacemen?"

"No, I don't think...pardon, I _know_ what I witnessed isn't extraterrestrial. I'm a mathematician, Major. I deal with numbers and facts. I believe there's life on other planets. It's a mathematical certainty. However, I'm certain beings from another galaxy, or even our solar system, aren't visiting Earth. If they are, it wouldn't be in disks. Not the size I'm talking about. Space travel would be a complicated endeavor requiring...well, I could spend hours discussing the hypothetical _and_ the actual constraints. Hours-and-hours of boring jargon. But here's what I learned at Fort Sumner: I saw a disk and I know it wasn't from another planet. Ergo, it came from this one."

"This one?"

"Manmade, of course. A new category of airplane or flying machine, culled from the ruins of the German Luftwaffe. The Army is experimenting with them now, hence the uptick in sightings of flying disks. My personal experience aside, I figure this is a predictable result of the war. Those architypes the Germans devised are too intriguing to ignore. But I'm sure you know as much, Major. You must've have heard of the foo fighters."

"Shoot, everyone _heard_ of 'em. Rumors, tho, Mister LaPaz. Just rumors."

"There's always a kernel of truth in rumors.

"Those crews were hypoxic. Almost every reported sighting occurred at night and-"

"I know the aeromedical mumbo-jumbo. But haven't you wondered why German pilots never saw the foo fighters?"

"How would we know if they did or didn't?"

"Inference, Major."

"Come again?"

"Never mind. My point is, we're flying them now. Us and the Russians. When the news broke in Roswell, I thought it might've been a disk. Perhaps Russian. Then I realized the Army wouldn't have said it was if it had been. Does this follow?"

"So, you settled on a Jap balloon? No offense, but you're all overish with your speculation."

"I'm _certain_ it's a Jap balloon. Still had the bomb attached to it, eh? Ready to blow?"

"It was nice talking to you, but my tongue's getting tired."

"Just wink or something. Tell me I'm on the right track."

Sam seized his mug, turned his back, and walked away.

# 17. Road Trip

On the morning his leave expired, Sam barged past the Colonel's fretting secretary and spilled into his office, opening the door as Blanchard, feet on desk, sipped his morning coffee. The Colonel had returned from leave the same day, looking robust and sunburned. Sam looked less than hearty: hair mussed; uniform askew; trembling hands; skin all yellow-like, yellow like an antediluvian scroll.

"My days of molesting balloons are over," Sam declared before Blanchard could open his mouth. "I want outta here, sir."

The Colonel's hawkish peppers pinballed up and down, studying Sam as if speedreading a book. Then he whistled and said, "Jesus, Major, you ain't looking so hot."

"Something I ate. Or something I breathed. I'm leaning towards the latter, but I shouldn't have to tell you, sir."

"Try option three: something you drank."

"How 'bout we agree to disagree."

Blanchard swung his feet, sat up, and said, "Fine. Fair is fair. I'll rotate you out, as promised. Nevada, right? But...um...you're going to need to pass a physical, Major. I can see about getting you an extra week to get...cleaned up. Don't take this the wrong way, but you're going to need it."

"I don't want to go to Nevada."

"Huh? We talked about-"

"I don't want nutin to do with the Tough Shit in Nevada, okay? I want to stay away from the spooks and the secrecy."

"What's your request?"

"Air Training Command."

"Instruction?"

"Affirm."

"Are you sure? It'd be safer playing Russian roulette."

_Not a bad idea_ , Sam thought.

"Are you sure?" Blanchard repeated.

"I'm burned out, Colonel. I need to go back to _why_ I started flying. I want to enjoy doing sumptin again, and I'd have more fun teaching than whatever takes place in Nevada."

"Suit yourself. Once I put this request in, though, you're pigeonholed. I've used my allotment of good will because of...well, you know. I can't undo what's done."

"I understand."

"So be it. I'll have your orders by the afternoon."

"I've another request, sir."

Blanchard smirked and then said, "Of course you do."

"I want to pick my duty station. You can't tell me I haven't earned-"

"Shush, Major. I'm not gonna argue with you. You're right. You've earned it."

Sam exhaled, relieved the old bulldog wasn't in the mood to bark. Of course, he had _earned it;_ he _earned_ more than a pat on the fanny and a new station. But these rewards would have to suffice, as would a third one Sam had hidden up his sleeve...

"So, what'll it be?" asked Blanchard.

"Greenville Army Air Base."

"Greenville? Greenville, _Mississippi_?"

"Yes, sir."

"I'm sure you have your reasons...and I'm not gonna remind you again about undoing what's been done."

"I understand."

"Suit yourself. I'll get on the blower, post haste."

"Thank you, sir."

Blanchard leaned back, lifted his feet on the desk, and informed, "I'm heading to Fort Worth sometime next year. SAC Eighth Air Force Headquarters. Roger Ramey's keeping a seat warm for me. I had hoped to leave sooner but change of command is never a quick process. But once I'm outta here, I will _never_ set another toe in New Mexico, so help me God."

"I've made the same vow, sir."

"Yeah..." Blanchard mumbled. "Yeah...you know, this was one fucked-up situation we found ourselves in, Sam. Beyond fucked-up.

"Yes, sir. Way beyond."

"But... _ahem_...I should get your orders squared-"

"I'm sorry, sir," Sam interrupted, "but I have a last request."

"Eh?"

"Dale Palmer."

"Who?"

"Dale Palmer. D.P. The name on-"

"On the balloon."

"Yes, sir. I want to get word to his next of kin."

"No way," the Colonel rumbled, crossing arms and then ankles. "Uh-uh, Major. This isn't-"

"It's the _least_ somebody could do for his family, sir. If you were his father, or wife, or kids, wouldn't you want to know?"

Blanchard's face relaxed, somewhat, and he spent a few seconds puckering lips before saying: "I appreciate the sentiment. I do. And you're right: his family deserves closure. The problem is, I have a name. A _common_ name. No branch, no rank, no idea if he's enlisted or commissioned. Dale Palmer could be English, or Australian. He might've survived the war-"

"And you believe in Santa Clause," Sam interjected.

"I'm not-"

"We have a starting point, sir. We know Dale was a prisoner of the Japanese, he's still missing-"

"How do you know? He might've survived. Or his body might've been found. His parents or spouse or siblings, whatever the situation...they might've been told."

"Lots of _might'ves_ your spouting. You don't believe this anymore than I do."

"Major, it isn't my job, or yours, to deliver bereavement news."

"His family should-"

"No! N! O! Drop it. This isn't your obligation, son. Now, if you want to get the fuck out of Roswell, I need to start mashing toes."

Disappointed, but not surprised, Sam nodded and turned for the door. _There's more than one way to skin a cat,_ Walt Pix reminded from beyond the grave. Sam decided, long before walking into the Colonel's office, he'd put a face to Dale Palmer's appellation _no matter what_...but it'd be _a lot_ easier if Colonel Blanchard helped grease the skids.

But, as Sam twisted the doorknob (and thought about _all_ the phone calls he'd have to make to Navy BUPERS and the APRC, and _all_ the stories he'd be spinning to indifferent secretaries, and _all_ the hoops he'd be jumping through to reconnect with a long-lost chum from basic, or the Air Corps, or a carrier, or a platoon...on and on the lies -which wouldn't be difficult considering how adept he'd become at lying...but still- and...the task would be daunting, but it'd _doable_ if he played the cards just so), the Colonel slapped his desk and then said:

"Fuck you, Major, for being such a tack in my ass. Get back here."

***

This is what happened next...

The second week in August, a month to the day the foolishness at Foster's Ranch began, Sam loaded his Sixty Special and put Roswell behind him. He had 23 days to kill before reporting to indoctrination training at Lackland Field in San Antonio...which allotted enough time to accomplish an act of benevolence brainstormed the evening before he met with Colonel Blanchard.

The 530-mile trip to Lackland took nine hours through monotonous, drowsy country. He cranked the radio, watched the scenery pass, counted the dashed white road stripes and, later, tallied oil derricks. Arriving at dusk, Sam checked into base housing and spent the evening unpacking; the next morning he beat feet for Pittsburgh, a mere 1,531 miles northeast (according to the AAA roadmap he plucked from the frail metal rack at a filling station outside San Antonio). He planned fifteen-hour days behind the wheel; at this clip, he'd make Pittsburgh in two.

Day one: Austin, Dallas, Little Rock, and Memphis. Day two: Nashville, Louisville, Cincinnati, Columbus and Pittsburgh. After visiting Mr. and Mrs. Gene Palmer, he'd return to Lackland along the same course.

According to Colonel Blanchard, locating people named Palmer wasn't difficult; there were Palmers' scattered throughout the country. But the correct Palmer took detective work...

***

"For the record," Blanchard informed, "the Accounting Agency _believes_ around 79,000 Americans remain unaccounted. As luck would have it, only seven Dale Palmer's were listed MIA when the war ended."

"Lucky for us," Sam muttered.

The Colonel consulted an open folder on his desk and said, "I didn't mean...you know what I'm getting at, Major. It made the process a little easier. Two of those fellas were identified in late '45 and early '47. France and North Africa. Still on the books: a sailor on the submarine _Wahoo,_ lost in the Sea of Japan in '43; a Marine on Iwo in '45; a Navy pilot during the battle of Leyte in early October '44; an Army pilot in the New Guinea campaign...mid-43; and another sailor, an Ensign, from the _Yorktown_ at Midway in '42." Blanchard then sighed, looked at Sam and said, "I think we can assume the two sailors are lost to the sea. The Marine....I'd venture he's not our Dale Palmer. What are the chances he was hauled to a camp by the Nips? They couldn't resupply the island, let alone worry about prisoners."

"Which leaves the two pilots."

"Affirm. And both were POW's. The USN Dale Palmer, taken prisoner on the Philippians...eh...the Nips reported his capture to the IRC. They also list him as passenger, _wink-wink_ , onboard the transport _Oryoku Maru_. The _Maru_ departed Manilla on 13 December and was sunk by planes from the _Hornet_ on 15 December. Survivors were plucked from the water by the Nips and transferred to other transport ships, but Dale Palmer doesn't appear on any manifest after 15 December."

"Then it's gotta be the Army's Dale Palmer."

"Um-hmm. Captain Dale Palmer, registered as a POW in 1943, transferred to Camp Number 3, Northern Honshu in late 1944. No record exists after his displacement to Japan. In fact, most of the prisoners from Camp 3 are listed MIA. A handful were liberated after the war...by the way, this makes for depressing literature. The Army recovery teams reported POW's taken to Japan had a forty percent mortality rate. _Forty!_ Never mind those who disappeared, like Dale Palmer. Even after they surrendered, the Nips refused to list all their POW camps. I'll give you one guess why."

"I don't need a guess, sir."

"This wasn't easy detective work, Major. It took a week of phone calls and now I owe a big favor to a Captain Switzer in Army Personnel Records. APRC is reticent to divulge next of kin information."

"Spouse?"

"Not married. His parents live outside Pittsburgh," Blanchard reported as he removed a page from the folder and held it in his right hand. Sam grabbed the drooping end, but the Colonel held tight his side between bushy fingers and said, "Major, I'm of the mind this should be handled by somebody trained in this kind of business...but after talking to a man in the know, I've learned the Army won't pay a visit until remains have been identified. I'm willing to make a phone call-"

"His parents deserve more than a phone call, sir."

"You _really_ want do this?"

"Unless there's a chance it isn't him, I do."

"Well...I checked Dale's service record. West Point grad, Class of '41. Deployed to Port Moresby August 1942. He flew P-40's...and those fellows had it rough. Marked as MIA 21 June 1943, during the Battle of Lababia Ridge. Next appeared on a Nip register, prisoner transport to the Phillipeans, and then bounced around until finding a cell in Camp 3."

"Jeez," Sam whispered. "I'm joyriding in San Francisco and he's fighting the Nips."

"Huh?"

"I said...I...um...I had this weird thought, is all. _Ahem_...sir, you asked, _do I really want to do this?_ If I'm being honest... _no._ But I found my way here and...and I'd like sumptin good to come from my time in Roswell. Do you understand?"

"Eh...no...and it isn't your responsibility."

"I think it is, sir."

"Are you...what's going on, Major?"

"I just explained, sir. I'd like sumptin good to come from my time here."

"Have you thought about what'll say to his parents?"

"I'll mastermind something."

Blanchard hemmed and hawed for a moment, deciding on duty or decorum. Decorum won the battle, as Sam knew it would, and Blanchard released the paper.

He could find Dale Palmer's parents in Mt. Lebanon, Pennsylvania, a suburb south of The City Of Bridges. Sam pictured them sitting in rocking chairs; he pictured Captain Palmer's picture surrounded by candles; he pictured a cross hanging on the wall above it. Sitting, rocking, waiting for word on their son. With no body there'd always be the hope (no matter how farfetched it seemed) their poor son could be alive. The notion defied reality, the reality being thousands of prisoners were killed and buried in unmarked graves. They were dumped like garbage, tossed aside after their bodies were bled of life.

The Army was finding corpses, parts of corpses, and bones throughout the Orient. Those remains had one thing in common: they were stripped of identification, dog tags and insignia. Identification of the English, Dutch, American, Chinese, Korean, Filipino, Aboriginal, Australian, and miscellany carcasses could take years, or never. At least Sam could share Dale's fate, and it wouldn't cost him anything but some driving and alone time.

It seemed like a fair trade.

***

Crossing the country proved therapeutic. On paper, the trip appeared daunting. But once he started carving miles, the hours frittered away as introspection seized the mind.

Tho it wasn't true, Sam felt like he had spent more time aloft than with feet on the ground. Flying with Dad, the FSA, the military...the Earth became a foreign land with strange dwellers and odd customs. Over time, his relationship with terra firma and the people living on it widened into a chasm. Yes, problems began when he trod ground.

After hitting the road, Sam realized his logic amounted to b and s. He bought into Dad's convoluted philosophy of flying and believed, without question, them _scaredy cats_ on the ground lacked stones What did Sammy Pix have in common with scaredy cats? _Nutin._ Sammy was braver; Sammy took risks; Sammy idolized the old man for taking a dirt nap, _prolly_ humdinged, and...

And wasn't this a teeny bit fucked-up?

In fact, Walt Pix's doctrine be as nutty as Ma's religious nonsense. Did Sammy ever question the old man's beliefs? Did he ever argue with the old man? Did he ever judge Walt Pix an idiotic simpleton?

Nearing Little Rock on Day One, our vexed pal conducted a serious heart-to-heart.

When Sammy was a wee bit, Ma often told him: _'The voice in your head is God, son. When you hear The Voice, He is speaking to you.'_ And wouldn't you know? Ma spoke the truth to the little boy. The Voice became a constant companion. Warm, reassuring, The Voice told Sammy to be kind; The Voice reminded him to thank people and hold doors for old women and greet everyone with a smile, even Negroes; The Voice said, _thee doth unto others and others will doth to thee_. In those exact words, too...which be strange because pint-sized Sammy didn't speak in tongues.

Over the years, sumptin changed. The Voice turned nasty. The Voice slurred. The Voice jabbed like a firebrand. The Voice compelled Sam to doth without consequence...

Act the fool...

Run his mouth.

He realized (in Arkansas, of all places) the mean Voice sounded like Dad, and this brought tears to Sam's eyes. The old man wasn't a bad guy. Sam's friends were cursed with fathers who were vile: like their children were personal tormentors or possessed by the devil, these patriarchs doled beatings and mounded verbal abuse; they smacked their old ladies; kicked dogs; dressed in white sheets; committed lynching's.

Walt Pix didn't whup or castigate. He didn't hate Negroes. Heck, Dad dropped Sam into a cockpit and taught him to fly. But the old man also taught Sam how to drink...and drinking transformed The Voice.

Outside the capitol of Arkansas, our glum pal thought he'd give God a try for old time's sake. What could it hurt?

"Well, God," Sam announced to the windshield, "if you're listening, here I am."

Lickity-split, The Voice answered, _"I hear you, five-by-five."_

"So...I-I can't go on like this," Sam hawed. "I-I gotta change...you know...something."

" _Whadda mean you gotta change?"_

"I'm miserable. I'm miserable...and I'm stoopid...and I'm tired of bein' miserable and stoopid."

" _Bah,"_ The Voice scoffed. _"It doesn't matter what you do, Sammy Pix. You ain't ever gonna be happy."_

"Fuck you," Sam whispered.

He reached his hand to twist on the radio, but The Voice repeated its dire prognosis: _"Dat's right, Sammy. You ain't ever gonna be happy."_

Our pal forgot the radio. He let his right hand fall to the seat; he sighed; he nibbled on his lower lip...

The Voice harangued: _"There ain't no reason to be happy, Sammy. There ain't no reason to plaster a dumbshit smile across your face because you know what I know. You know you're living to die and there ain't nutin else."_

"There's more to life than dying," Sam mumbled in a monotone voice.

" _Naw._ _You're gonna die, Sammy. You ain't special. Ted Williams is special but he's gonna die. Cecil Dawber...dead. The crews of those birds shot down over Europe...dead. Dead like the people you bombed, the Jews in camps, those Japs in the capsule, Hitler, FDR, Captain Palmer, and so on. They all dead, boy. No exceptions. Heh. Even as you ruminate about dying, you're dying. You're dying from the Oriental flu, he-he."_

Sam gripped the wheel and rasped, "Leave me the fuck alone."

And then...then The Voice returned, but it be sweet and chirpy...and it sounded like Ma: _"Sammy, there's nothing you can do about dying. Everything dies. Why don't you make the best of your time on Earth? Wasting time worrying isn't a way to spend your life."_

"I ain't wastin' nutin," he argued. "I'm gonna give Dale Palmer's parents a message. I'm going back to instruction. I'm going back to Greenville. I'm gonna see you, and the Preacher, and Sue and-"

" _And nothing changes until your mind is settled, dear."_

"I don't think I can settle it, Ma. Honest, I don't. I'm broke and..." Sam caught a glimpse of himself in the sidemirror...

Talkin' to nutin, babblin' like a lunatic...

And sealed his mouth.

The Army didn't handle nutcases with tact. Patton slapped 'em. Fellas in the Eighth, too scared to face death again, were branded _cowards_. Many were drummed out of the service with an ugly discharge stamped on their DD 214: Bad Conduct (known as Bad Chicken Dinner) or Other Than Honorable. There was shame in being spoiled meat, never mind the other consequences. Doctors would throw Sam in a hospital, truss him in a straitjacket, and remove part of his brain. There he'd sit, locked in room, nattering nonsense to walls, or barred-windows, or the ceiling, or-

" _Or,"_ The Voice interrupted, _"why don't you stop drinking for a spell and see how you feel. Now, it's not going to be easy but-"_

"But I gotta do it," he sighed.

" _Yes, you must. You must and you will."_

Temperance sounded feasible in the cosseted environment of his car; for about the millionth time, Sam picked through the detritus of his humdinged life and concluded booze was a _Big Problem_. Liquor turned unhappy Sam into calamitous Sam; liquor made him feel lousy; liquor drained the life outta him.

"I will not drink anymore," he promised hisself. "I will not. I will not. I will not..."

When Sam stopped for the night in Memphis, he resisted the _very_ _persuasive_ urge to find a package store. Instead, he shook out two of the big pills the doctors in Roswell gave him, chased 'em down with a cup of tap water, and climbed into uncomfortable rack.

He labored to remain sedentary...

He clenched teeth and laid straight as a board...

He blocked out Dad's Voice...

He blocked out Ma's Voice...

He chanted: "I will not. I will not. I will not..."

It took a long time to fall asleep...

But during them so-called Witching hours -a time Sam be getting humdinged in his _old life_ \- sleep arrived...

And he awoke after the sun took flight.

He arrived in Pittsburgh the following evening...

The gray smog of steel mills hacked a glum grime what stuck to our pal's skin; an _Iron City Beer_ billboard -pointed at his lodge window- glowed in the effervesce of a misty downpour.

He snapped the drapes shut...

He shook out two of the big pills the doctors in Roswell gave him, chased 'em down with a cup of tap water, and climbed into uncomfortable rack.

He labored to remain sedentary...

He clenched teeth and remained straight as a board...

He blocked out Dad's Voice...

He blocked out Ma's Voice...

He chanted: "I will not. I will not. I will not..."

Sleep wasn't any easier to attain than the previous evening...

His mind pinballed between getting humdinged and meeting Dale Palmer's parents.

After a scant kip, our nervous pal awoke before dawn...

He made circles around the small room...

He stared the garment bag containing his uniform and debated the pros and cons of putting it on.

He wasn't acting in an official capacity for the Army; hell, Sam couldn't tell the Palmer's much of anything other than their son no longer kicked. One thing he _would not_ share: the news Dale Palmer had been complicit in helping a Jap balloon transport God knows what to the US of A. Sam didn't hold ill will towards the captain; Palmer didn't have a choice...

Except...well, he did, and Scarhead would argue it would've been better _not_ to participate. Still, casting derision on the poor man wasn't worth the energy.

Hundreds of revolutions later, Sam decided against the uniform.

He dressed in a blue suit and ate breakfast at a greasy spoon. Frenetic with the aftereffects of five cups of Joe, he crossed the Monongahela River on the Liberty Bridge...

Drove through the Liberty Tube...

Passed Dormont and modest middle-class homes...

Joined Washington Road...

Rolled into Mt. Lebanon.

Polish, Catholic and Lutheran Churches dotted both sides of the street sounding bells in unison as if welcoming him. Sidewalks peppered with nattily dressed Sunday morning worshippers.

Following his sloppy chicken scratch, Sam turned left onto Shady Drive and slowed the car to a walk. Scanning address, he passed a couple pushing a stroller, two boys in overalls and ballcaps climbing a tree, a scrawny calico cat sunning on a lawn...

Bingo.

_774_. A two-story brick dwelling; open air porch, two chairs; clean, neat yard; giant rose bush teeming with blood red flowers; push lawnmower leaning at a forty-five degree angle against the side of the house; a white walled, shiny black Cadillac in the carpark. Our pal sidled the Sixty Special next to the curb and then killed the engine.

He rehearsed a pat speech during breakfast: _Hello, I'm Major Sam Pix from the United States Army. I'm sorry to be the bearer, but documents gathered by investigators suggest your son is no longer alive._

If the Palmer's pressed for more, Sam planned on steamrolling them with some Army jargon.

Sumptin innocuous sprinkled with a hint of truth...

Until Captain Palmer's remains are identified, no official word of his death can be announced...and whatnot.

Rudimentary plan in hand, Sam climbed the concrete stairs, crossed the porch, straightened his tie, and then rattled the screen door.

"Coming!" a male voice bellowed from inside.

Sam took a step back, adjusted the tie again...

The door opened and a middle-aged gentleman stepped outside: slim; thinning red hair; black slacks and a white dress shirt opened at the collar; a newspaper folded under his right arm. A corncob pipe wending gray smoke from its bowl jutted from his pressed lips. He scrutinized his Sunday caller with squinty green eyes.

"I'm looking for the Palmer residence," Sam said, "and I...um..." The prepared speech -delegated to a notecard in his head- disintegrated into a pile of torn paper. Sam tried to muster a smile and then babbled, "And... _ahem_...I-I'm with the-"

"Are you selling something?"

Sam shook his head, and raised his hands to show they were empty.

Sliding the pipe from one corner of his mouth to the other, the fella said, "My wife and I are going to Mass in a half-hour. I don't have time-"

"I'm sorry, sir," Sam interjected. "Are you Gene Palmer?"

"I am, but as I said, my wife and I are going to Mass. I don't have time to deal with whatever nonsense you're peddling. And on a Sunday morning, too. What's this world coming to?"

"Sir, I'm not selling anything. This will only take a few minutes. I-I'd like to speak to you and your wife."

Something in Sam's deportment must've screamed _military_ and _bad news_. Gene Palmer plucked the pipe with a steady hand, but the blood in his face ran south. He opened his mouth, shut it, and then peeked over Sam's shoulder at the blue sedan.

"Who are you?" Gene Palmer whispered.

Our pal cleared his throat and then said, "I'm a Major Sam Pix of the United States Army, sir. I regret to-"

"Where's the Chaplin?" Palmer interrupted. He looked Sam up-and-down; indignant color returning to his face. "And you aren't in uniform! What is this? Are you a prankster? You ought to be ashamed of yourself!"

Needless to say, the conversation wasn't unfolding as Sam planned...or hoped. He considered turning tail, getting the hell out of Dodge...

" _Yep, yer a reg'lar scaredy-cat, son,"_ The Voice chimed. _"A'ight, scaredy-cat._ _Git outta here. And while yer at it, why doncha git yerself a cold one for a job not-so-well-done."_

Walt Pix's words did the trick:

"My name is Sam Pix," our hero machine gunned before Gene Palmer could slam the door. "I'm a Major in the Army. I here to tell you about your son, Captain Dale Palmer. He was a pilot, went missing in '43 near New Guinea. Stop me if I'm wrong."

" _Was,"_ Gene Palmer croaked. The newspaper fell from his arm, landed on the porch, and opened to the sports page. A headline shouted, _'BRAVES SCALP ROE, PIRATES 15-2'_ , before a breeze flapped the paper like a deck of cards.

Sam removed his wallet, extracted the CAC card, and handed it to Gene Palmer. The latter studied the i.d. for a few Mississippi's and then said, "Come in, Mister Pix. His mother needs to hear this."

***

A framed, football glamour shot sat propped on the mantle above the fireplace. The straw-haired, smiling kid posed with right leg lifted high and left arm straight-out, like he was about to hurdle-and-stiff arm a defender in the same motion. Underneath the pose in white letters: _HB PALMER 43._ Judging by the look of the living room, Sam gathered the Palmer's weren't waiting with bated breath for his return. This solitary portrait, no others, testified to their son's existence. At first, Sam felt relieved; the Palmer's knew this day was coming, and our pal's sad message would be greeted as mere formality. But then he placed himself in their shoes and...and it was stoopid to believe they'd be pleased.

_Really_ fucking stoopid.

He waited with arms crossed, staring at Dale for untold minutes (putting a face to the name, at last), while Mr. Palmer ascended the stairs to gather his wife. He heard voices from above...a loud male, a louder female...and what sounded like a door slamming. More indecipherable chatter, all masculine...then the creak of floorboards. Sam turned around and straightened his tie for the third time.

"My wife, Sarah...she...she needs a minute," a pale Mr. Palmer said, returning the CAC card to Sam. "You aren't pressed for time, are you?"

"No, sir. I'm not in a hurry."

"1941 squad," Mr. Palmer said, motioning to the picture. "They lost to Navy, 14-6. Dale scored the Cadets only touchdown. He had three as a firstie. Did you go to The Point, Major?"

"No, sir. I enlisted and joined the Air Corps."

"You're a pilot?"

"Yes, sir."

"Did you know Dale?"

"No, sir."

"And you're not here with clergy?"

"It's a-"

"It's what?" Mrs. Palmer called from the top of the stairs.

Sam cleared his throat, glanced at the Mister, and then said, "I have information, ma'am, but I'm not here in an official capacity."

"Is he dead or not?" she rasped.

"I'm sorry," Sam mumbled.

Mr. Palmer nodded, took a seat on a floral couch, and studied his hands. Sam stood at a semblance of attention, listening to the ticking of a clock stashed somewhere in the house. Mrs. Palmer...well, it seemed to take forever, but at last she descended the stairs and fell onto the sofa next to her husband.

Sarah Palmer looked dowdy, or perhaps it was the moment: straight flax hair; puffy eyes; ankle-length black dress, no stockings, bare feet. She fixed Sam with a scowl as if holding him responsible for the fate of her boy.

From thousands of miles away, Colonel Blanchard's hoarse voice nagged, _'Major, it isn't your job to deliver bereavement news. But since you're there, tell them something, shithead!'_

"Like I said, I'm not here in any official capacity," Sam explained, looking from the Mister to the Missus. "The Army won't tell you Dale's fate until they find his body and-"

"Oh, my poor boy," Sarah Palmer cried, putting a hand over her mouth.

"Dear," her husband said with a sigh. "We _knew_ the outcome, even if we didn't want to believe it."

"I'm sorry," Sam said for what seemed like the hundredth time. The more he claimed as much, the less sincere it sounded. Yes, there's a reason men of the cloth were tasked for these missions. At least they could express proper inflection and pertinent expression. Sam prolly looked like he was getting fingernails yanked.

"Can you tell us where...when...something of substance?" Gene Palmer asked over the hiccupping sobs of his wife. He wanted answers. And Sam didn't have answers, at least not pleasant answers.

Sweat pebbled on our pal's forehead.

"Oh, my sweet Dale," the Missus whimpered.

Her sad voice kicked Sam in the gonads. To shut her up, he reverted to old habits: "I worked in intelligence...prisoner interrogation...er...after I got done flying, I mean. We're still finding them...the Japs...and...and we're questioning them, okay? The information I have came from a guard familiar with...see, Dale went to Japan in '44, Camp 3 on Honshu, and he...he died there in 1945."

"Did they kill him after the surrender?!" Gene Palmer cried, standing from the coach as Sarah Palmer continued to wail.

"No, sir."

"You're certain?"

Sam nodded, dry swallowed, wiped his brow. "I'm certain," he said. "I'm certain the information is solid."

"How do you know?"

The conversation meandered down a road Sam hadn't anticipated. He wanted to keep the story succinct and now....

"How do you know?" Mr. Palmer repeated.

"A prisoner revolt," Sam answered, scratching his neck. "Dale was one of the organizers. From what I understand, he was fearless. Brave. You should be proud of your son..."

***

Boy, he wanted to get _humdinged_!

Yet he didn't give into temptation...

Not after he left the Palmer residence; not in Memphis when he stopped for the first night on the return to Texas; not in Lackland during instructor indoctrination.

Squared away, Sam kept the nose down and mouth sealed; he kept his drawers hiked and avoided watering holes. The other students in class judged _The Major_ a fuddy-duddy. Half a decade to almost ten years older, our hero had little in common with the young, rowdy airmen. Most hadn't seen action during the war; they flew transports well-behind the front or in the States. Some were in college when the Nips surrendered.

Several classmates theorized the _decorated_ fuddy-duddy Major got kicked to ACT cuz he pissed on the wrong foot. Sam heard the rumors; he heard them and chuckled.

If they only knew the fuddy-duddy once tangled with flying saucers; if they only knew the fuddy-duddy once caught the Oriental flu in Roswell...

But they didn't know, nor would they ever know so long as the fuddy-duddy stayed the course.

And that's what happened.

Given the choice of jet or piston engine aircraft, Sam elected the latter. He figured the jets were a work in progress and the Stearman...shoot, he learned to fly humdinged in the Stearman with Daddy. The Army called them PT-17's and painted the biplane green or silver, not yellow. Different appellation, different livery, different men behind the yoke...but the airplane flew the same. There was no _humdinged_ flying in the Army but Sam hadn't lost his touch: he could still could land the birdie on a motherfucking daffodil.

It took a spell, but Sam evolved from a so-so instructor into a darn good one. Combat stories made him popular around the coffee pot, but he kept the tales succinct and not at all tall. Military training had come a long way since he matriculated through the program, tho the notion of boldness and oldness still applied. He tried to make his students understand the difference between stoopidity and self-assurance; most of young men listened...but a few didn't. They'd learn or they wouldn't. Either way, Sam lost zero sleep stressing about the bolshiness of young men.

In 1946, Colonel Barry Goldwater (Sam's instructor from the 39th) formed the Arizona National Guard and, despite the handwringing from old and young racists alike, desegregated the militia. Two years later, President Truman issued EO 9981 and the U.S. military followed suit. Most of the Solid South yahoo instructors in Greenville decided to make life hell for the "coloreds". Not our pal; he trained those fellas without batting an eyelash. When problems arose with those idiots, he sidestepped the chain of command and dealt with the issues himself. As Sam learned after a decade in the Army: sometimes the command hierarchy be a mite incompetent.

He trained over four dozen blacks, a handful of Hispanics, and one Pacific Islander. But not a woman. The Army wasn't ready for female pilots...which be a shame because he knew one woman capable of flying circles around most men. Sam trained her well, and he delighted in watching her grow. Alas, Sue Post's pursuit of a career in aviation required more than prodigious skill. She'd have to bound _many_ barriers.

So, in a nutshell, this is the story of how Sam Pix made his way back to Greenville after being banished from the Mississippi Delta ten years prior. Ma, his sisters, Preacher Post, and all the cast of characters abounded including stray dogs and Ray Bob, the Sheriff of Washington County. The Klan loitered, worse than ever, but they didn't mess with the Preacher or Sam. He ate at Doe's once a week (medium rare T-bone, baked potato, and a Coke), had a brief affair with Betty Lou Daugherty and then a serious relationship with another woman before deciding he couldn't give her what she wanted. Marriage, kids, the whole nine...this ship had sailed for Sam Pix.

Four years after arriving in Greenville, Sam decided enough of the military, of the Aviation Cadet Training Program, of wearing a uniform every day. When his commission expired, he walked away without a look over his shoulder.

He did well for a spell.

Like all things, though, the good times come to an end.

Just like The Voice said they would.

# 18. Ft. Detrick

If nothing else, the affair in Roswell provided useful information to the researchers working on the U.S. Biological Weapons Program at Ft. Detrick. Doctor Sanders returned with a briefcase full of notes and his superior, Dr. Hill, assembled a program for Tularemia research. In the meantime, a host of other projects were undertaken. The halls and laboratories filled with foreign scientists; overseen by their benevolent American colleagues, Ft. Detrick became a convention of bustling refugees working in concert.

Abstemious reservations of creating offensive weapons of war were tempered by fancy sophistry. Dr. Hill stressed the point -like the Japanese had years earlier- biological and chemical weapons research, _'is a defensive venture for in case scenarios'_. "In case" the Ruskies blow an agent on the battlefield, for instance. Thus, the work at Detrick would _save_ lives.

In 1951, Dr. Ishii became the director of the "Infectious Blood Disease Program" under "Operation Whitecoat". He urged Dr. Hill to make use of service members, through voluntary programs, as test subjects. The soldiers were allocated extra pay and leave in exchange for their bodies. For some strange reason, Ishii obsessed with the idea of using insects as vectors, in particular deer ticks.

Them guinea pigs, however, had different opinions on the matter. To wit: _they hadn't signed up for this shit._ Letting ticks burrow into their skin and mosquitoes suck blood for hours at a time? _Pfft._ _For the birds._ Led by a few pert non-coms, the soldiers staged a strike and demanded to know what they were being exposed to. Ishii roiled with indignation. Enlisted men had no recourse in the Imperial Army. _'The whole group of them should be been shot!'_ he fumed. Dr. Hill dismissed the volunteers and told Ishii things worked a tad different in the States. Never fear, though! A pool of new victims...er, _subjects_...would be procured.

The Korean War kicked off in 1950 and consciousness objectors, among them Seventh-day Adventists, refused to accede to the draft. The Adventists spawned from the Millerite movement of the mid-19th Century, which spawned from the brain of one William Miller, a farmer and scholar of the Karaite Jews, who believed (after careful study of the Karaite Jewish Calendar) Jesus Christ _intended_ to return to Earf, come hell or high water, on 14 April, 1844. The "Great Disappointment" when Jesus didn't return had a solid explanation: in so many words, the Son of God just be tardy to the party...or sumptin. Or maybe William Miller read the calendar wrong...or sumptin. Or maybe True Believers had been Raptured...and those left behind on the rotten Earf be unworthy of salvation. Lo, everybody associated with the Millerites presented an opinion and all opinions were just as batshit crazy as they were dissimilar. The long and short: the Millerites splintered, gave birth to sects of their own and viola: The Seventh-day Adventists formed...

...smack in the nick of time for the American Civil War...and, you know, that really was a fucked-up time in America when you think about it. A lot of people got fucked up by disease, incompetent generals, Gatling guns, cannons, Old Ironsides, submarines, trench warfare, lousy medical treatment (kids, repeat after me: _penicillin wasn't discovered until 1928, well after World War One),_ draft riots...and then got fucked-up again after the war during Reconstruction, the formation of the Klan, the Panic of 1873...oh, and the Compromise of 1877 (a _really, really_ fucked-up deal if you don't already know) followed by the Great Railroad Strike of the same year... _ahem_...but this is a story for a different time.

The Adventists kicking during this fucked-up time believed, and hoped, the Second Coming was...wait for it... _just_ around the corner. By the 1950s...welp, there be no suggestion Jesus had _any_ desire to return in all His glory, praise Him, but the Seventh-day worshippers clung to their principles with dogged veneration.

Among these varied philosophies: resistance to the military draft. In lieu of facing jail time, Adventists were presented with an ulterior form of service. And so, with a limited understanding of what they were getting into, members of the Seventh-day Adventists became Ishii's test subjects for the duration of his stay at Ft. Detrick.

When MacArthur pressed Truman to nuke the Commie Koreans and their Chinese allies to the Stone Age, the President resisted and instead turned to Ft. Detrick with a request. In early 1953, with the war on the Korean peninsula stalemated at "Line Kansas", the 38th Parallel in popular culture, the U.S. Air Force bombed Communist forces with plague bombs and Tularemia. The result, like the Japanese offensive at Nanking in 1937, proved inconclusive. The scientists went back to the drawing board and the Korean Conflict, as of this writing, remains unresolved.

Ishii's service at Ft. Detrick ended in 1957, after a Venezuelan equine encephalitis vaccine he was testing killed two and sickened about one hundred others. It wasn't the first incident where Ishii's experiments became lethal: the year before, an anthrax project he engineered killed one. Ishii's flippant attitude about the casualties broke the proverbial straw over the camel's back. Discharged and handed around fifty thousand dollars for his trouble, Dr. Ishii returned to Japan. Encased in the cluttered world of post-war Tokyo, Doctor Shirō Ishii, former Surgeon General of the First Japanese Army, became a ghost.

# 19. Greenville, 1953

With a shaky right hand, Sam patted the yellow empennage of the Stearman Model 75 like it deserved affection. And she did. The old girl had taken him up-and-down and then delivered him to the grass strip of origin in one piece. They had a simple relationship: he treated her right and she reciprocated.

He found her at an auction in Greenwood the spring before last painted a disconsolate gray (by the way, the color of the plane matched the hair on his head), the last of eight being kicked to the curb. The Stearman trainers were archaic. The Air Force had quicker, nimbler aircraft; besides, the cadets didn't want to fly old biplanes. Ten years ago, the Stearman were top-of-the-line. Sam had been top-of-the-line then, too...but, like everything in life, the cream rises to the top.

Sam bought the Stearman for a bid of 2,000 greenbacks. He put a couple grand more into refurbishing the entire plane: Pratt & Whitney R-985 engine, new undercarriage, sprays, nozzles, and fresh paint job. He decided against the hopper replacement for the front cockpit seat because the plane would still serve as a trainer. He lost an extra twenty gallons of pesticide but what of it?

The hanger smelled like oil and gasoline, obnoxious fumes to most, but Sam savored the aroma, this volatile potpourri of his youth. Some people smell roses; he inhaled chemicals. Maybe this answered the _why_ tormenting his mind, but Sam figured sumptin else, _at the least_ , shared a portion of the blame. As he learned a few months earlier, the days for ole Sam Pix were numbered. Except he wasn't old, and getting humdinged by cancer seemed a lousy fate for a fella who appreciated, at last, how happy he was to be alive. But he didn't want to think about the countdown...not right now.

Our doomed pal walked from the tail, along the right side, to the rear seat, hand sliding along the skin, feeling rivets and burbles. The paint job had been shoddy, and the little bubbles created parasitic drag. A trifling amount but triflings add up over time. The sum of a few hundred triflings equaled consequence. Consequence cost fuel. Fuel cost money...and one day Sue would be in the poor house cuz his old drunken school chum Gary Webb painted the airplane like a water tower.

The goggles and cap rested in the backseat, next to a tin of snuff. He reached in to grab the kitty and heard footsteps from behind. Knowing he was going to catch hell for the sloppy landing, Sam spun and mustered a frown.

"I was watching when you came in," Sue Post said. "Looks like you ground-looped."

He subdued a smile and said, "Then you need to get your eyes checked. Just mashed on the rudder, quick-like. Wind weather-vaned her."

"Is that a word?"

" _That,"_ he scoffed. "What I tell you about using _that_?"

She planted hands on hips and replied with sass, "I'll use _that_ any time I want to use _that_."

" _That_ is an indicator of ignorance. You wanna be specific in your vocabulary. Every fool in Greenville uses _that_. Even the newspaper people."

"At least _that_ is a word. I know _weather-vaned_ isn't."

"Sure it is. My word. Ergo, I didn't ground loop, I weather-vaned. And there's a big difference, sis. A _big_ one."

"Hmm...I think you ground-looped it."

"What do you know? You haven't soloed yet."

"I know enough not to ground-loop."

"Listen, I'm man enough to admit when I screw the pooch. In fact, I once... _ahem_...weather-vaned a Flying Fortress. Talk about never hearing the end of it."

Sue grinned and then grabbed a tall iced tea from the tool bench next to her. A smart, introspective kid ( _Jeez, she's not a kid,_ his mind reminded. _She's almost eighteen!_ ), and a good student. If she kept at it, if she ignored Sam's stoopid brethren and pervading toxic mentalities, Sue _would_ succeed. Yes, Sam knew aptitude composed a portion of achievement; yes, he knew Sue had disadvantages to overcome, the biggest being a female and the next being a darker shade of white. Despite the obstacles, he'd get her pointed in the right direction. Half-sis, step-sis, half-breed...whatever others called her, she was his sister.

At first, things had been awkward when Sam returned to Greenville. He'd seen her all of zero times since leaving the state all those years ago. What he knew of Sue Post came from Ma's infrequent letters. This and the business of Ma and Preacher Post gettin' busy before Dad died...and having a kid not long after...made for a stilted relationship, never mind the color barrier. But they grew closer and, in the process, he discovered she harbored an intense curiosity in aviation. This information had to be pried, however, because Sue never thought she'd be allowed to touch an airplane, let alone fly one. He took her up for the first time two years prior and then nurtured her skills like a mother hen. Relishing the ecstatic look on her face was sumptin he'd never forget...but thinking about it also saddened. He'd be unable to see her take more than the first steps.

"Sometimes I can't believe you flew in the war," she said, handing him the glass. Sam snatched it, rubbed it against his forehead, and then took a sip as she mumbled, "But I know what you're going to say."

He swallowed and then answered, "Yep, and I know what you're going to say. My answer to _that_ isn't going to be different, either."

"Please, Sam? You never talk about it."

"There's nutin you need to hear."

"I just...I can't imagine."

"Picture a whole lot of stoopid."

"If it's so stupid, why'd you do it?"

He stirred the drink with the straw and said, "I'm the picture of stoopid."

" _Pfft._ Some answer."

"You know, there's a reason young people do the fighting. The old timers sit back and let war play out cuz they're the ones with whatcha call...tactical smarts. Or so they believe. Young bucks are too naïve to think they'll get killed. It'll be the other guy, or the enemy, but not them. And some, like me, didn't care one way or the other."

"Didn't _care_?!" she cried. "How could you not care?"

"Welp...I kinda thought my destiny...you know, it's stoopid. Like I said, a whole lotta stoopid."

"Come on. What do you mean by, _my destiny_?"

"Oh...heh, when I stomped through those years you're living in, I thought I'd kick off in an airplane. Made sense givin' the circumstances. Of course, flying with you, I might still get the chance."

"I've _never_ ground-looped, Sam."

" _Weather-vaned_ , okay? Now, how about we-"

"Hold on. You thought you were going to die?"

"Shoot, every time I went up I figured the odds were better than fifty-fifty. Think about it: Little ole me sittin' in an airplane loaded with bombs, detonating flak, enemy fighters...about a million things could go wrong."

"Were you scared?"

"Nope...yes...both. It's complicated. How the show played out...I didn't have a say in the matter.

"The destiny stuff sounds like Ma."

"Geez...I guess it does," he said with a laugh.

"Maybe she's not wrong."

"I'll grant you, there's a lot we don't understand. Why things happen..." he rubbed his temple, grimaced, and then continued, "and why things don't. We had to bomb this French town a couple times, I forget the name, but the Germans built U-boat pens and these suckers were reinforced concrete. Impenetrable. We tried hittin' 'em a couple times...nada...so the brass, my bosses, decided to level the town. Destroy the roads, train tracks, warehouses. Burn the place to the ground. Leaflets were dropped a few days ahead of _the_ raid. We warned the Frenchies, and the Krauts, what the future had in store if they stayed. I watched this town get annihilated...fifty-sixty bombers do a lot of damage...and wondered how many families were being killed. Women, children, old men, old women...dogs and cats...on and on. Gettin' out of Dodge wouldn't have been easy. I don't know how much say the civilians had considering their town was occupied by the enemy. Yet, there we were, bombing the stuffing out of 'em. Why? Because a nut from Austria wanted to rule the world."

"A whole lotta stupid," Sue said, shaking her head. "How many people died?"

"Who knows? I remember...um..." he paused, studied her wide-eyes...discerned rapt attention (not morbid curiosity)...and continued: "...the 446 BG-"

"BG?"

"Bomber Group."

"Like a squadron?"

"Similar. During the war, bomber groups were divided into units: very heavy, heavy, medium, light. The B-17 fell under heavy, and my group, the 398th, had 48 bombers flying out of Nuthampstead. Within each group, there's a squadron...about twelve planes in a squadron, give or take, plus escorts...little P-51's to take care of the bad guys. On a typical raid, three of the four squads would depart and join with other squads from other airfields. But your squad, your callsign, would stay together in what's called a combat box formation. Reason why is because each group had different targets. Now, the box formation looked like a...oh, I guess a rhombus from above or below. From the front, or the back, you'd see three planes low, three planes high, and six in the middle. Safety in numbers, right?"

"I get it. A convoy."

"Yep. There were advantages and disadvantages. Flyin' at the back edge, you lacked protection to the rear. And bein' low in the box...well, sometimes those bombs falling from above...eh...you get the picture?"

"How often did-"

"It happened quite a bit. And when it did, you'd see a bomber lose a wing, or the tail, or the cockpit, or get cut in half. Whatever the case, she was a goner. Depending on the severity, the crew could sometimes get out. But those gunners, not the waist fellas so much, but the ball turret or tail man...they had a harder time getting out of their stations."

"Wow."

"Um-hmm. Not a pretty sight. So, imagine you're sitting there maintaining a heading while flak is blowing and the Jerries are buzzin' and the escorts are battlin' the Jerries and bombs are fallin'...you felt like a big ole bullseye, and you were, but you couldn't think about it, which is the hardest thing in the world. Even harder when you're watchin' other planes go down."

"What happened to the 446th?"

"Huh?"

"You started to tell me about the 446th and-"

"Shoot, I got sidetracked. The 446th, early '44, hit a Dutch town by mistake. Bad intelligence or somebody misread the charts...but they killed close to 900 civilians."

"900!"

"Bombed a school-"

"Did anybody get in trouble?"

"Slap on the wrist. What did I say? _Stoopid things happen in war._ A whole lotta stoopid. The reality is, like it or not: to stop nuts like Hitler, people gotta die. There's no way around it. I felt bad for the Frenchies, and the Dutch, and anyone hit by mistake. But the German cities we annihilated? Naw."

"Naw?"

"See, it takes a community effort for a nation to go nuts, which is why we bombed their communities. Whether they wanted to admit it or not, _every_ German was engaged. They were the enemy. The _stoopid_ enemy. So...so, you see what a whole lotta stoopid produces? Then again, if I wasn't stoopid, and my buddies weren't stoopid, and none us stoopid young bucks didn't put an end to the Nazis stoopid b and s, we wouldn't be chit-chatting."

"I suppose-"

"No, not _I suppose_ ," he scolded. "If the Nazis won the war, sure as spit you'd be on one of them trains." Sam thought about Benny Green and then added, "Maybe not the first train, but prolly the second or the third."

"I hear what you're saying but...is it any better in Mississippi?"

"I'm not saying it's _much_ better, but it used to be worse. Way worse. Ma can tell you about the worse."

Sue giggled and then said, "Like the time you dropped rocks on the Klan."

" _Bricks_. And I had a justifiable reason. The Klan is full of _stoopid_ bullies. Stoopid ole bullies who pick on people they know can't fight back."

"Just like the Germans, huh? Bunch of idiots."

"Well...the Nazis were bullies, and they were stoopid, but they weren't idiots. See, there's a difference, and the difference made the Germans _real_ dangerous. The Kluckers are mean, but they ain't smart. The Klan won't ever take over the world. Just dumbshit...pardon the language...dumbshit towns in America."

"The Nazis weren't smart," she jeered.

"You're mistaking motivation for adeptness. Their motivation was stoopid, but the Nazis excelled, top to bottom, in implementation. Hitler built an economy around mobilization; he put people to work and then gave 'em a reason to fight with the propaganda. And those scientists? They came up with nifty gadgets. One time we were over the Harz Mountains and the Jerries had these airplanes, except they weren't _nutin_ I'd ever seen. Looked like... _ahem_...er...they were fast, sis."

"What'd they look like?"

"You know," he mumbled, "like airplanes. Fast airplanes."

"Jets?"

"Jets...yeah, jets."

"How fast?"

"Faster than a hornet." Sam patted the Stearman and then said, "Faster than this ole girl."

"My, how you baby it."

"Not _it._ _Her._ A good airplane is your best friend, and you best show her your appreciation. Don't want her gettin' jealous."

"You love her more than people, don't you?"

Sam considered his response for tick and then said, " _Most_ people will let you down. Selfishness and vanity clouds rational judgment. I'm not immune it to; you aren't, either. You gotta realize few people have your best interest at heart. But this machine? She's your pal; she'll be yours one day. And you know what? The best thing about havin' an airplane is the ability to go anywhere. Jump in and take off. Nutin holding you back as long as you take care of her." He caressed the airplane, shook his head and sighed.

"Are you okay?"

"Shoot, I'm great, sis. All right, enough talk. Let's go flying. We gotta work on your turns around-a-point."

***

"Pix Pesticide Application, Instruction and Sightseeing" wasn't a booming business but Sam scratched a comfortable life. Crop dusting paid most of the bills. Few be the number who desired to see Mississippi from two thousand feet, but there were enough peepers to make it worth the effort. Some got sick and never wanted to fly again; others caught the bug and the bug turned into an obsession. These folks were a rare breed; they also had the means to support the expensive hobby. In the early 1950s, recreational flying drew two kinds of people: daredevils and the well-to-do.

Once-in-a-while he watched the television or read the newspaper, but Sam kept a diminutive profile on the outskirts of Greenville. Ma's pious kookiness hadn't waned, tho he abandoned the need to ridicule her beliefs. He even acknowledged there _might_ be something to the fate nonsense. After all, here he was. Here to help his sis, here to fly unburdened...and, as it turned out, here to die...

***

The trembling started in late '51.

The right hand, a subtle spasm here and there. Then the right leg, same issue. At first, Sam chalked the herkie-jerkies to poor sleep or the stress of flying with lousy cadets. Some days, zero shaking. Others...like his paw had electricity coursing through it. By mid-52, when he left the Army, his vision clouded, or went tunnel or sometimes blotted to nutin without warning. After a few seconds of blinking and eye rubbing, normal vision returned. Next came the headaches, strange smells (like a fresh spread of manure be under his nose), and trouble sleeping.

Our pal didn't tell anybody, but the maladies concerned. None of the issues effected his ability to fly...yet...but Sam knew they carried the potential of grounding. At last, in November '52, he paid a reluctant visit to the doctor and described the symptoms.

New to Greenville, Doc Dupree looked like Ozzie Nelson except with more goo in his spiffy hair. He sucked on a cigarette and scribbled notes on a clipboard as Sam described the symptoms.

After Sam concluded, the Doc mashed the heater in an astray and asked, "The hand and leg shaking started last year, followed by sporadic loss of vision, obnoxious smells, headaches and trouble sleeping? I have to ask, Mister Pix, why didn't you seek attention sooner?"

"I'm not a fan of doctors," Sam responded, crossing arms.

"This is for future reference, okay? A sudden change in motor function is something you must address."

"It wasn't sudden."

"Any gradual change, then. I checked your paperwork and saw you listed active duty in the Army until May. Did you see a doctor?"

"I got a flight physical every six months; but between my last one and the discharge, I hadn't been to the med shed."

"You should've had a discharge eval."

"I did. I walked in, handed the form to the Captain, and he signed his name."

"You still should've-"

"Yeah, well, I didn't."

"History of hospitalization?"

"I broke a few bones over the years. Arm, my nose, fingers and toes."

"Arm?"

"Airplane crash."

"Airplane crash?"

"Any landing you can walk away from..."

"No other visits to the hospital?"

Sam chuckled and then said, "Once, when I was in the Army, I got...uhm...pretty sick."

"How long?"

"Five days, I think."

"You think? What happened?"

"Flu."

"Flu knocked you out-"

"I think."

The Doc furrowed his brow.

"It's a long story," Sam said.

"Where did this happen? Maybe I could pull records-"

"New Mexico, but you won't find any records."

"New Mexico?"

"Worst goddamn time in my life."

"What'd you do in New Mexico?"

"Oh...I reckon I can't say. Ask me in thirty years and I might spill the beans."

"Work on the bomb?"

"God no! I ain't smart. I was a pilot. Still am a pilot, I mean, but I flew in the Army."

"Radiation exposure?"

"Not by choice."

Dupree set the clipboard aside and checked Sam's reflexes, told him to wiggle fingers and read from an eye chart. Then he looked into Sam's eyes with a bitty light while making grunting sounds. Finally, Doc Dupree patted Sam on the right knee and said, "My gut tells me you're a no-nonsense guy so... _ahem_...here's the deal: your right pupil isn't dilating or contracting to light. Further, it appears the optic nerve head is discolored. It's possible something is pressing against the back of the eye which-"

"Possible?"

"Something's there," Dupree pronounced, squeezing Sam's knee.

Butterflies filled Sam's stomach and he whispered, "Something like a tumor, right?"

"Based on what you told me...the smells, headaches, involuntary muscle movement...it's a mass of some type. I did my residency at the U of M Medical in Jackson. You're going to wait here while I make a phone call, and I'll get you set with one of the best brain guys in the state. The sooner the better. Let him have a look and tell you..."

***

The _thing_ in Roswell...

Sam wondered if it was the _stoopid_ Jap thing.

Up until the visit with Doc Dupree, the thing in Roswell had become a distant memory. The event hadn't been expunged, of course; the unpleasant ordeal lurked in the brain matter, but he didn't pick at it unless prodded.

On occasion, current events stimulated cognizance. When he read of an epidemic or outbreak somewhere in the U.S. he thought of Roswell, of the Jap at his bedside, of the illness he acquired from three dead combatants two years after the war ended. He wondered if another balloon had been uncovered by a curious rancher in some dusty region of the country, a rancher whose wife was stepping out on him.

He saw General Roger Ramey on the tv one morning, a Sunday news show on CBS, deflating the notion "UFOs" were "interplanetary vehicles" with a smug grin below his mustache. Tongue-in-cheek, the General also claimed these non-interplanetary vehicles posed no _hostile_ threat. The reporter should've pressed Ramey, but the lackey journalist smiled into the camera as the program dissolved into a cigarette commercial.

Ramey had become the Air Force's "saucer man", an attack dog unleashed to shred the accounts of the growing phenomenon while spitting disinformation. The truth lurked somewhere between Ramey's rhetoric and the media reports...but the truth wouldn't be heard. As a result, the fervor of people who believed UFOs were anything _but_ terrestrial led them down a rabbit hole of wild theories...

***

Doctor William Hillop, droopy-eyed eyed behind thick glasses, puffed out cheeks and tapped a pen against his chin. On his desk, three giant black and white X-ray images of Sam's brain...

_Your sick brain_ , Sam's sick brain said, as Sammy folded hands in his lap. The hospital gown bunched at his thighs and made crinkling sounds every time he took a breath. The ordeal to collect the X-rays took an hour in a room smelling like ozone. He could feel the invisible poison shooting through his skin. Meanwhile, the Doc and nurses stood in another room behind a plate of glass about ten feet thick.

The interior of the University of Mississippi Medical Center-Jackson, lauded as the best hospital in the state...and this wasn't sayin' much, by the way...smelled like antiseptic and glowed white from the albedo of polished floors, walls, ceilings and uniforms. _Sterile_ be the word. Sterile _and_ dreary. People came to die in the hospital; people came to die stuck in a room, staring at whiteness, while nurses and docs poked and jerked and prodded and fussed.

Grandma Pix, Dad's ma (the only grandparent little Sammy ever met), got a carcinoma in 1925. She couldn't breathe, hacked all the time, and coughed blood. _'Be the roll-your-owns,'_ the old lady rasped from her deathbed in Greenville's pissant clinic. It took Grandma four weeks to die. Until the last week of her life, Grandma always claimed _, 'I be gettin' better. I feel better'._ Ten-year-old Sammy watched her demise, the wasting and false optimism...

While waiting for Dr. Hillop to deliver what had to be bad news, Sam decided the end came on his terms.

He wasn't gonna be a scaredy-cat. He'd stare death square in the eyes.

"Yes," Dr. Hillop mumbled, "yes, this is..." He dropped his pen and spun the chair, gave Sam a staid look through magnified lenses, and continued, "There are two tumors, Mister Pix. One is pressing on the occipital lobe, and the other is touching the frontal lobe."

"Oh, good," Sam said with contrived flippancy. "I have a bunch of other lobes, don't I?"

Hillop frowned and then said, "Unfortunately, you might have another tumor on the brain stem. I'll need to complete a biopsy to ascertain the nature of the growth."

"A biopsy?"

"It can't be helped. These X-ray images are prone to attenuation."

Sam could muster no humor from the information except a resigned, "Three tumors?"

"Two for certain. Either meningioma or hemangiopericytoma, but I can't rule out oligodendroglioma. Again, without a biopsy I can't be certain of the type, or if the masses are benign or malignant."

"Jeez, how many biopsies are we talkin'?"

"Several."

"What's your gut say?"

"I can tell you what research says. Most meningiomas are benign, but the problem isn't cancer. The problem is the effect the tumor has on your brain. Hemangiopericytoma, on the other hand, is a destructive form of metastasizing meningioma. Do you know what metastasize means?"

"Grow."

"Grow _and_ spread. It's also possible these are not primary tumors."

"Meaning?"

"You might have cancer elsewhere in your body."

"Fuck me," Sam mumbled.

"Oligodendroglioma, the other type I mentioned, also occurs in the frontal lobe. I have seen cases of an aggressive type of malignant tumor...a glioma but with the capability to reproduce with rapid and devastating results. However, the discoloration near the brain stem, a possible glioma, is rare in adults."

"Heh. So, the good news is I have two tumors. The bad news is I _might_ have three, and I _might_ have other tumors sprinkled throughout my body. Well, ain't that a kick."

"I'm sorry. I know it's a lot of information to process."

Wiggling toes, flexing hands, our pal asked: "What's the timeline?"

"Let's not get ahead of ourselves. There are treatment options."

"Like what?" Sam scoffed. "Operation?"

"Surgery has come a long way, but the size and location of the tumors would make operating tricky. I doubt any hospital in the country would attempt such a procedure. There is radiation treatment but, depending on the composition of the tumors, whether they're benign or malignant, the radiation might have little to no effect. I think we'd be wise to start with chemotherapy. Do you know anything about chemotherapy?"

"It's like a shot of chemicals or sumptin, right?"

"In a matter of speaking. Nitrogen mustard is injected into the carotid-"

"My neck?!"

"Your neck."

"How pleasant is the experience?"

"I won't deny it's uncomfortable. Nitrogen mustard causes one, some, or all of these effects in patients: vomiting, lethargy, anemia, hair loss."

"What the heck is nitrogen mustard? Some kinda poison?"

"A derivative of sulfur mustard."

_Sulfur mustard_...the words rattled in Sam's head until it struck the correct synapse. Slack-jawed, he asked: "Are you...are you talkin' about mustard gas?"

Hillop nodded like it was no big deal.

Our pal held a different opinion: " _Mustard gas?_ " he cried. "You wanna pump me with mustard gas? The same shit used to kill people in World War One?"

"Not the same, Mister Pix. A derivative."

"Are we talking measurable results or is this an experimental deal?"

"In lieu of other options, what choice do you have?"

Sam wanted to grab Hillop by the coat, shake him, and ask how injecting poison into him seemed a _sage_ procedure? In a hundred years, doctors would no doubt laugh at such a stoopid procedure, just like doctors today laughed at bleeding impurities. And then there were the side effects. Laid up, sick...what were the chances chemotherapy made any measurable dent in the two, or three, or undetermined, number of tumors?

"Let's pretend I don't do anything," Sam said.

"I don't recommend-"

"Look, Doctor, let's talk like men. How much time do I have?"

"Hmm...around ten to eighteen months, untreated. If you want bluntness, I can tell you what to expect."

"Might as well give it to me."

"You'll notice an accelerated loss of vision in the right eye, a decrease in fine motor skills with the right hand, the inability to use the right leg...and it's possible you'll go blind in the left eye. Frequent seizures are another consequence. In the last stage of illness, tasks you've taken for granted will become impossible."

"Hell's bells," muttered Sam. "At some point, I'm not gonna be able to take care of myself."

"Without a doubt. Feeding, bathing, use of the toilet..."

"In ten months?"

"Perhaps sooner. Perhaps later."

"What's the usual?"

"Sooner, rather than later. I'm sorry to be the bearer of bad news."

_I'm sorry._ Sam recalled his conversation with Gene and Sarah Palmer, all the _I'm sorry's_ he said. _Sorry_ didn't do jack squat comforting them, and _sorry_ did nutin for Sam.

"Treatment buys me what?" Sam asked. "Another few months?"

"Hard to say. I apologize for ambiguity, but each situation is unique. There are other experimental treatments I can use-"

"I'm not gonna be a guinea pig."

"Your decision, Mister Pix. I won't beg. However, I encourage you to exhaust all options before deciding it's not worth the trouble."

"But you're not saying I'm gonna be cured."

"Based on past situations with similar characteristics...no. Miracles have occurred, though."

Sam stood, tore off the gown, and then said, "I'm going to home to think about it, Doc."

***

Our pal thought about it.

And our pal didn't return to Jackson.

Matter of fact, our pal didn't visit another doctor again.

Winter turned to spring. He flew a bit, watched Sue solo, had her primed for the private pilot practical...which she passed, no problem.

The hand trembling worsened. Headaches intensified. Vision in the right eye deteriorated. His speech become slurry.

At the start of June, it became clear he'd be unable to fly much longer. So, he crammed hours with Sue, priming her towards the commercial certificate, and hid the illness as best he could. Like those other secrets Sam stored, he'd keep word of his demise locked in his cellar.

Sue commented, on occasion, about his trembling, syrupy inflection, and how he walked a mite slower. Sam laughed off the comments to "old age".

Tho he suffered persistent fatigue, sleep became near impossible. The throbbing in his head was bad enough (constant were the thoughts of jabbing something sharp into his skull to release the pressure), but when he closed eyes, an array of fireworks exploded, fizzed, popped. He smelled cordite; he heard the bouncing organ of merry-go-rounds, the laughter of children, carnival barkers...

Every evening, mixed amongst the din and detonations, The Voice proffered glum news: _'_ _You're dying.'_

Sam always replied: "As are you."

Then they'd both laugh, Voice and Sam, until laughter turned into crying.

One night, The Voice lashed: _'_ _Yew shoulda taken the Doc's offer of treatment. Instead, yer gonna waste away in this hovel, Sammy. Yew and me, wasting to nutin. This ain't fair. Yer doin' this to make me suffer!'_

Wiping tears with his trembling hand, Sam answered, "It ain't personnel, fella. I got sumptin else cookin' before I kick off."

The "sumptin else" be a journal...but he postponed making pages until 7 July 1953. Aligning thoughts took time, and Sam desired to be succinct yet truthful. Recalling all the details from Roswell required dutiful concentration.

In a fifty-page spiral notebook purchased at Anderson's Gas and Produce for a dime, he hunkered over the pages and constructed sentences starting with words like _But_ , _With_ , and _And_. His high school English teacher would've given him an "F".

He wrote three hours the first night, two hours the next, four hours the third evening until...ten days later, the notebook filled with his chicken scratch. Once finished, he signed his name and the date on the bottom of the last page. Then he stuffed the confession into a Hasley boot box, sealed it with a lid, shoved the box on the highest shelf in his closet and piled newspapers on top.

Even if nobody read the diary, purging gave him peace. His headache lessened and Sam wondered if secrets were the cause of his illness, not the rotten mutation of his cells. And if somebody found the boot box and took a gander at the jottings, so what? Sam wouldn't be around to deal with the consequences.

Our pal bought sumptin else at Anderson's: a liter of Covington. Resisting the urge to drink until the task be complete, he hauled the bottle out of the closet a second after stacking the last broadsheet on the Hasley. Good friend, bad friend, indifferent friend, the booze would be with him at the end. Before he twisted the cap, however, Sam took pencil to napkin and wrote a diminutive note: a few sentences to Sue and Ma, a request for the handling of his body, and a messy signature on the bottom.

Short, not sweet, but he couldn't think of anything else to say. Thereafter, he tossed the pencil on the table and reached for the whiskey...

After five years and eleven months of sobriety, Sam Pix took his next drink. He chased the first one with a few more until the room spun and he passed out on the kitchen floor. At last, he tickled deep dreamless sleep for the first time in months. The next morning, he awoke _humdinged_ for the last time. Our pal started the day with a double, sat bleary-eyed at the table and looked out a streaked window. Radiation fog, like muslin, shrouded the front porch.

Mind blank, he knocked back two more doubles as the sun rose. Then Sam Pix sauntered into the bathroom and grabbed the straight razor from atop the sink...

# 20. Sam's Box

She took her first solo in March, three turns in the pattern: two touch-and-goes and a full stop. Sam watched from the ground and snipped the tail of her shirt after she brought the airplane to a stop and jumped from the cockpit. Beaming, he tacked the white tail to the corkboard in the hanger and then wiped his cheeks of tears.

Next came a short solo cross-country flight to Greenwood; days later another solo cross-country, the long one with three stops, made easy by following the Mississippi to Vicksburg, Interstate 10 to Layfette, and Interstate 49 to Alexandria. When she blocked for fuel in Alex, the fat rampie asked if she was "Nigger Earhart". The slur stung and she dwelled on it back to Greenville. Dwelling turned into daydreams, _pleasant_ daydreams where Sue imagined herself shoving the Avgas nozzle down the cracker's throat; pleasant daydreams caused her to lose focus; loss of focus produced a moment of panic when ground and map didn't jive. Getting lost was bad enough; she'd never hear the end of it from Sam. But if she ran out of fuel and crashed, the cracker in Alex would've had a hearty laugh at her expense.

Dripping sweat, she flew circles and tried to locate a familiar road or landmark, but all she saw below were cotton fields. Then she remembered her training and tuned the NAV radio to 110.20. Yes...weak at first, but a signal she could bracket with the needle. She followed the GLH VOR to locate Greenville, tracking the 010-degree radial inbound, and found the grass strip (and Sam sunning himself in a lawn chair) six miles southwest of the nav aid.

Sue mentioned the fueler in Alex, her rage, and the fright of getting lost. Sam draped his arm around her as they walked into the hanger and said, "What have I told you? You're going to get a lot of b and s from _stoopid_ people. It's best you develop a hard shell. I promise, though, someday it'll be better." Sam seemed distant as he talked- now she knew why- but at the time she thought he didn't care.

Her private checkride, with a CAA examiner Sam knew from his days in the Army, was a breeze. Ink still wet on her new ticket, she took her father for his first airplane ride. Preacher Post laughed for the half-hour they were airborne, and he couldn't stop raving after they landed.

"My little girl is a pilot!" he crowed. "Who'd have thunk it!"

'Twas a remarkable achievement, but she couldn't wait to tackle the commercial certificate. Sam taught her Lazy-8's and Chandelles; they covered ground reference maneuvers and emergency procedures _ad nauseum_. What she lacked were the prerequisite hours. Hitting the magic 250 mark appeared unimaginable, at least to Sue Post and her paltry 100 something hours.

Sam once told her, _'An opportunity to fly is an opportunity to pad the logbook.'_ Well, he had given her an opportunity on this steamy July Sunday. And with that thought, she glanced at the urn bouncing on the seat next to her and tried not to blubber.

While her sisters and parents watched from the weedy banks of Huntington Point, she put the airplane into slow flight like she'd done a hundred times with her brother. His patient words echoed ( _drop the flaps, slowly reduce power, pitch the nose...not too much...I don't wanna here the stall hooter..._ ) as she slipped off the urn lid. With one hand on the yoke, she dumped the contents over the side, watching Sam Pix blow across the sky like a cloud of bugs. Then she dropped the container and watched it tumble, top over bottom, until it slapped the dark water and shattered into pieces. The current swept the jagged debris south, towards the Gulf, where once upon a time (according to Sam) U-Boats hunted laden freighters leaving New Orleans.

Waggling wings, she buzzed her family before returning to the grass strip, sobbing the entire time.

***

Sam's brief napkin note ended with the word, _Sorry_. It began, _I have a health condition treatment would prolong, not cure._ Sandwiched in between: a request for cremation, disposal of ashes, and the location of his will. Signed and notarized two months before he died, Sam left the airplane and his old Sixty Special to Sue, and the Ag business (including twenty acres containing the grass strip and hanger) to Preacher Post until Sue turned 21. _Fat lot of good the business will do without a pilot,_ Sue griped. But Preacher Post didn't sweat it. _Soon, you'll have your commercial license,_ he said. _Until then, you keep practicing._ The rest of his estate (the house, belongings and $25,000 in the bank) went to Ma. A few days after dumping the ashes, Sue helped her mother clean the house of his presence.

While Ma Post packaged utensils in the kitchen, Sue went to work on the bedroom. There wasn't much: an army uniform hung in the closet, and she folded it into a garment bag; a small wooden box on his dresser contained medals and ribbons; several t-shirts and pants; a pair of shoes; socks; a brown porkpie she never saw him wear. She bundled the clothes and hat, and then put her hands on hips. What remained? _Nothing._ Nothing except some newspapers on the top shelf of the closet.

Using a footstool, she stood on tiptoes, pulled the newspapers down and found the cardboard boot box. Light, likely empty, she thought about throwing the box away but then changed her mind. Perhaps he put money or something of value aside...

Sue opened the top and then frowned when her eyes peeked the blue spiral notebook. On the cover, written in black pen, the words: _"Roswell Journal"._ Curious, herself removed the notebook, opened to the first page, and read:

As best I can remember:

This took place in July 1947. I was a technician for Project, or Operation, Mogul at Roswell Army Air Force Base. I arrived in January of the same year from D.C. My name is Sam Pix, I was a Major at the time, and I worked under Drs' Peoples and Crary in Building 15, near the Motor Pool, on the west side of the field.

"You wrote a diary?" Sue whispered. She'd never seen him write anything except numbers in a logbook. Flipping pages until the end, she sighed and decided:

_Not now._ _Someday, but not now._

She tossed the notebook into the shoebox, closed the lid, and placed the box in the package with the clothes.

Then Sue Post sealed the carton with white masking tape...

# Epilogue

Under a new name, Shirō Ishii moved to Tokyo and opened a free clinic, treating the sick with a variety of homeopathic and experimental remedies. Some of his patients suffered bizarre deaths given their ailments, but the allure of free care meant the line of sick never dwindled. Towards the end of his life, Ishii converted to Catholicism and received absolution of all pertinent depravities from an American clergyman at the Machida Catholic Church.

The Priest, hidden from Ishii by the divider in the confessional, listened to the malefactor's lurid tale (including a trite, self-soothing claim of, _'operating a complimentary health practice as a display of contrition'_ ) with mounting contempt. In theory, Judgment was reserved for God...yet the Priest couldn't help but hold opinions about this reprehensible monster. When the man was through spilling guts (both in the literal and figurative sense), the Priest (suffering a twinge of malevolence he hadn't felt in a _long_ time) wheezed: "I absolve you of your sins."

Our affable clergyman fashioned a decadent life before the Church: fornicator, swigger, gambler, and hooligan. God delivered him from this Hell into the U.S. Army. Arrested for assault and thievery, the Sinner begged the old man upstairs to give him another chance. The next morning, the judge offered the Sinner a deal: enlistment in lieu of jailtime. The Sinner thought, _'How lucky am I!'_ , but he didn't thank the Almighty for a opportunity at redemption. No, instead the Sinner calendar watched. _Four years of service and I'm off the hook,_ thought he. _Off the hook and free to sin again in the Big Apple!_

_Humph_. God knew the Sinner's mind. Sent to the Phillipeans, the Sinner worked in General Wainwright's office. It be a cushy life...until the Japanese threw a wrench into the Sinner's plans.

Lo, God decided the Sinner required further penitence, and He banished our sinning pal to roil in another Hell: the camp at Sandakan. After the Phillipeans fell, the Sinner became one of thousands of PW's the Japanese used as knuckle downers. With the support of a Navy Chaplin, the Sinner accepted Christ into his heart. Without faith, the Sinner's fate would've been like so many who succumbed to the circumstances. Jesus suffered far worse than a Jap camp, tho our future priest need be reminded of this on more than one occasion.

The worst of his doubts surfaced during interrogation. Tangential association to General Wainwright meant the Japs assumed the Sinner knew secrets. He didn't, but his interrogators pressed. Confined inside a small cage, denied food and water, subjected to torture...oh, how the Sinner's conviction _almost_ cracked. Night after night, the unobservable prisoner in the cage next to him voiced the same qualms in moans and curses. One evening, the Sinner be brained by an idea: attempting to both distract and infuse humanity, he tapped Morse code on the bamboo slats with his only remaining fingernail...

### .... . .-.. .-.. --- --..-- / ..-. .-. .. . -. -.. .-.-.-

...and received this response...

.. .----. -- / ..-. ..- -.-. -.- .. -. --. / -.. -.-- .. -. --. / .... . .-. . --..-- / .--. .- .-.. .-.-.-

...which kicked off a secretive friendship sealed by finger pats.

In metronomic dots and dashes, the two men found solace in sunny topics: baseball; women; of eating steak and ice cream again. On occasion, the stranger shared blue thoughts: he cursed his existence; he confessed a desire to die; he planned an elaborate, fantastical, and impossible plan to seize a Butterhead during interrogation and wring his yellow neck.

Through it all...

Through a swirling maelstrom of sodomy, sadism, and sorrow...

The Sinner implored his acquaintance to remain strong reminding, _'There's always a purpose to suffering.'_

They met in person near the end of the war after the Japanese fled the camp. If the scar was an indication, the Sinner's acquaintance went through the wringer. But the Sinner could relate; two missing fingers, a fractured leg and arm, and an eye gouged out with a piece of glowing rebar, testified on his behalf. Yet the Sinner survived. They both survived. God spared them for His purpose.

"You kept me from losing my marbles, pal," the man with the nasty scar said. "I owe you more than I can ever repay."

"The Lord worked through me," the Sinner rejoined. "The Lord kept us from succumbing. If you want to give thanks, give thanks to Him."

The man with the scar sighed and then said, "We'll see how much the Lord appreciates my thanks. If He'd be so kind, I'd like to give the Butterheads a dose of the Holy Spirit in person."

"Vengeance isn't the answer, friend."

Our fella with scar begged to differ; vengeance is _always_ the answer. There wouldn't be a Hell if God didn't fancy retribution. But he swallowed his tongue after concluding torture made men all kinds of loopy.

They kept in touch after the war, two men taking different paths in life but fused by their shared experience. The Church beckoned and the Sinner felt obligated to do God's bidding. What better place than Tokyo? For years he toiled; piecemeal, he built a diminutive following in the heart of the Shinto and Buddhists. He felt an urgent need to save these terrible heathens, show them the Right Way, and redeem their souls. As such, the Priest forgot his past suffering and rejoiced in the work of the Lord.

After the Jap's confession, something snapped in the Priest. Resurrecting left for dead habits, he stroked a wrathful thought: _This motherfucker needs to burn!_ When he returned to his chamber, the Priest picked up the phone and called a fella he hadn't talked to in almost a year:

" _Listen, I just heard quite the confession not twenty minutes ago. There's a Nip here, a doctor who runs a free clinic, and he feels shame for his actions during the war. The problem is, he requires an absolution I cannot deliver..."_

***

He had been through three agency changes since the end of the war: OSS became CIG became Central Intelligence Agency. The term _goon_ never sat well with him; goons were Al Capone-thugs, not trained agents. The man with the scar...consider him an enthusiastic advocate of national security.

After Roswell, Ishii tottered from a protective halo into a force field. Ishii's boss at Detrick, the vile Dr. Hill, granted the Jap "hands off" status... _or else_. This didn't mean the man with scar stopped watching the Nip...but he got sidetracked with other marks. The Capitol crawled with Reds, former Nazis, and members of the American military eager to make money passing secrets. A never-ending stream of suspicious activity, surveillance, and the occasional enforcement of domestic safekeeping kept our mutilated pal busy. Meantime, Shirō Ishii disappeared from whence he came, which irritated our hero. Someday, perhaps, he'd get the opportunity to greet the bastard again. Lo, someday came, at last, via a crackling landline in 1959.

Being inconspicuous in a sea of small people proved impossible, but the Butterheads had nothing but reverence for Americans after their little spanking. Convenient scapegoats were sacrificed -Tojo and other militaristic hardliners- and the royal family, deemed _guiltless_ by the powers what be, regained their place in the Butterhead pecking order. After working hard to destroy Japan, the U.S. took to rebuilding the nation; now the two countries were allies. Animosity? _Poof!_ Forgotten. Japan and America shared a common enemy: _Communism._

Sure, it's a sweet story...sweet like cowflop. Some things _could, would, should_ never be forgotten. No, sir. He couldn't inflict the kind of pain _all_ these slant-eyed curs deserved, but he'd make sure one of 'em got a dose of medicine.

He creeped the crowded streets with his Senators jacket, baseball cap, and mirrored sunglasses. The Priest reported the Nip ran a free clinic and there weren't many free clinics in Tokyo. Based on the location of the church, the Priest assumed the doctor's practice sat in the Machida section. After a few hours of searching, the man with the scar found a free clinic with Butterheads lined up butt to nuts. Our pal lazed on a park bench and watched the show. If the Doc wasn't _him_ , he'd sniff out the next clinic and repeat the process.

Due diligence proved rewarding; there wasn't a doubt in our vengeful pal's mind the gray haired, stooped, shambling Butterhead was _him_. Scowl plastered to his mug, he followed Ishii to an apartment building across from Serigaya Park. The name on the clinic, _Dokutā Aki Riko,_ matched the name of one of the tenants listed in the directory of the lobby: Doctor Aki Riko resided in Apartment 3.

Before dawn the next morning, he entered the danchi and accessed Ishii's unit by picking the lock. It was a large single-room apartment; partitions called fusuma were styled to block portions of the ima into different sections. Incense burned on the ledge of an open window. He slid open a paper door and found Ishii sawing logs atop a mattress on the wood floor. Our hero took a seat Indian-style...

The doctor stirred as the sun rose. He rolled around for a spell before sitting and stretching arms. Next came a protracted yawn, a blast of flatulence and...and then he spied the man at the front of the room and shook his head, as if trying to clear a haunting dream. The visitor removed the ballcap and watched Ishii's eyes trace the twisting scar across the bald scalp. But the doctor didn't appear startled. Indeed, he eased against the rolled pillow, crossed arms, and presented a stony countenance.

"Don't try to convince me you ain't who you are," the man said through a smile. "And don't tell me you can't understand what I'm saying."

Ishii cocked his head and frowned.

Annoyed by the silence, the visitor snapped: "How 'bout I start with who you ain't. You _ain't_ Doctor Aki Riko. By the way, it's real nice you people use letters to help us stupid foreigners who can't read squiggles."

"I remember you," Ishii whispered. "Roswell...the balloon..."

"Hard to forget a sociable face, eh?"

"I-I accomplished what _your_ country required of me."

"Yeah, well, those days are ancient history, Butterhead."

"I have cancer," Ishii said in a listless tone. "Blood cancer...leukemia...but I'm working towards a solution."

"A solution?"

"To the problem of cancer."

"You know, I _almost_ consider that a noble effort."

"A solution to benefit mankind," the doctor prattled, waving arms. "It _is_ a noble effort."

"I said _almost_. If a solution means your yellow ass keeps breathing the same air as me, then I don't find it so noble."

Ishii's lips curled and he hissed, "What do you want?"

"What did I say the first time we met? I don't ask for anything. You're gonna give. Here's the dope: I'm marking your name off my list, Ishii. Guys like you have become my mission in life."

"Everything I did was sanctioned by the governments I-"

"Shaddup. I'm not gonna argue with you. This is a long time coming for the thousands you murdered. Or maybe it's hundreds of thousands. Shit, who can say since all your work is under lock-and-key."

"I'm trying to make it right," Ishii said as panic seeped into his voice. "I-I have a free clinic! I treat people who can't afford medicine! Without me they'd have nowhere to go!"

"Ain't you a saint?"

"I'm Catholic!"

"So?"

"I'm...I'm trying to rectify the wrongs."

The goon stood, removed a small leather case from his jacket pocket, and then said, "I thought about sticking you while you slept, but I figured you'd want the dignity of seeing my face as I jammed it in."

Ishii started to move but the man was faster; he jumped on the mattress and restrained the General with his left hand. It was like pinning a piece of paper. With his right, the he flipped open the case and removed a syringe. Ishii went wide-eyed and squawked, watching the needle as the man tested the plunger. A small bubble of liquid formed and remained inert on the tip.

"A little present from an acquaintance at Fort Detrick," the man with the scar snarled, thrusting the hypodermic into a vein and discharging the poison.

"It burns!" Ishii gasped as the man withdrew the needle and stepped back.

"Heh. I didn't think it'd tickle, Butterhead."

Ishii groaned, "Wha...what is it?"

"Beats me," the goon answered with a shrug. "Something conjured in a petri dish, I guess. Maybe something you invented. Who can say?"

The former Surgeon General worked his mouth like a fish; he rolled onto his right side; he bowed into a fetal position. His breathing became hitched...raspy...and then lessened to naught.

The man with scar watched the Butterhead until sunlight blasted through a window. Bathed in orange, the goon felt for a pulse on Ishii's yellow skin. Mollified, he wiped the dribble of blood from the injection site, put the syringe into the case and snapped it shut. Then he collected the ballcap and put it on his head.

Scarhead blew out the incense with a single breath, watching the dark smoke drift out the window. The breeze, playful and carefree, dispersed the perfumed wisps until they existed no more.

