Upon arriving at his apartment, Brad fell onto the
couch, and began to sulk. On his way home, he had first
thought that death was the only thing worse than making a
fool of himself in front of his boss. It didn't take long
for him to decide that wasn't the case: if he were dead, he
wouldn't be concerned with what Wheeler thought of him.
Truthfully, there were several more humiliating
possibilities. First, he could have told one of his co-
workers about his story. If the other reporters had heard
him trying to pitch his article, they would have laughed him
out of town. Second, Wheeler could have let him write the
piece, causing Brad to loose any credibility he might have
for the rest of his career. Then there was always the
possibility that he might have told his story to the wrong
person and end up in a psycho ward... or living on the
street like Gatewood.
How could he have been so stupid? How could he have
allowed himself to believe Gatewood's ridiculous story? A
reporter was suppose to be objective, yet he had become so
caught up in the story that he had lost his head. For a
fleeting moment, Brad had actually believed that the Air
Force had somehow managed to keep their captive aliens a
secret. There was no way; hundreds of servicemen would have
rotated in and out of the compound. Wheeler was undeniably
correct when had said the aliens would have already rescued
their comrades. He had accepted the weight of the evidence
without ever considering the sources: people who saw UFO's
were crazy.
Like Gatewood.
But Gatewood had gone crazy after seeing the UFO,
hadn't he?
Brad shook the thought free of his mind, and decided
never to think of flying saucers again. He knew one thing
that could help him with the enforcement of his new policy.
It was quick, simple, and sure to make him forget about
aliens, UFO's, humiliation, and a certain long-legged,
blonde that had stomped out of his life without any
explanation.
What he needed was a drink.
He walked to the kitchen and opened the cabinet to find
he only had two choices: rum or vodka. The bottle of
Bicardi was half empty, and Brad could only drink it mixed.
The Stoli on the other hand, was half full, and in his
present mood, would go down like water. Besides, he'd
always wondered why the bat was on the Bicardi label.
Brad took the bottle of vodka and a glass to the couch
and settled in for a evening of serious drinking and
forgetting. As he started to pour, the phone rang, causing
him to jump, and pour vodka on his glass-top coffee table.
He swore loudly, damned the table, glass, phone, and
anything else that came to mind.
The phone rang again as Brad reached into the kitchen
for a towel, and dashed across the room to pickup the
receiver. He managed to drop the towel on the puddle of
liquor, but before he was able to reach the phone he bumped
his shin on the tabletop. Again the phone rang, and again
Brad cursed the world in general.
"Hello!" he growled angrily.
"Brad?" purred a woman's voice.
For a moment, Brad fell silent. He hoped, but knew
better: he hadn't given Melanie his phone number. To
prevent a deranged reader from calling him at home about any
of his stories, he had chosen an unlisted number, so she
couldn't have looked it up. "Yes, this is Brad Dartmouth."
"Brad, why didn't you tell me Roger wasn't human?"
Brad's heart stopped, his lungs tightened, a lump
formed in his throat, and choked out his remaining breath.
"Melanie?" Brad's legs gave way as the impact of Melanie's
sentence hit him full force.
"If you had told me Roger wasn't human, I might have
been better prepared. When I made contact with him, it
scared me."
"Wait a minute-- you're going to fast for me here.
What do you mean not human?" asked Brad, immediately
slamming down the vodka that hadn't spilled from the glass.
"You really don't know?"
No lies, Brad told himself, no more lies. "I think
Roger is a survivor of a crashed flying saucer that the Air
Force has been holding prisoner since 1949."
"Why didn't you trust me: I trusted you."
"Would you have gone to that hotel with me if I had
told you?"
"Yes."
Melanie's answer caught Brad by surprise. He found
himself at a loss for words, his mind fumbled with a dozen
lines, but nothing sounded right. "I would have sounded
like a lunatic, you would have thought I was crazy."
"The moment I saw you, I felt something-- like you had
these big plans, that you were going to accomplish something
great... It's hard to put into words; you were charged with
an energy I've never experienced before."
For an eternal second the line was quiet. Brad felt
the same way about Melanie, but was too macho to have ever
admitted that he was attracted to her in any other than a
purely professional or sexual way. "You said Roger wasn't
human. How can you tell? Could you see him?"
"No, I couldn't see him, but I could feel his presence.
You were correct when you told me he was the most powerful
psychic on Earth. I've been in convention halls full of
psychics that didn't have the energy I felt in that desert."
"Why didn't you ever notice it before?"
"He's several miles away from where we were. I
explained that even the best psychics have limited range,
he's far enough away that no one would find him unless they
were looking," stated Melanie.
"But he's real?" asked Brad desperately.
"Yes, and there is another one out there, too. They
are very much in tune with one another and at harmony with
their surroundings."
"I'm sorry; that doesn't make sense to me."
"You said they were prisoners, but I didn't feel that
from them."
"Of course they're prisoners, it's just that after
forty years, they've gotten use to it. Can you make contact
with them again if we go back to Alamo?"
"No."
"No?" echoed Brad in an excited tone. "Why not?"
"I know how hard it is for you to understand, but the
psychic energy I experienced was very powerful...
overwhelming, in fact. I don't want to risk contacting that
kind of force during an out-of-body experience again. It
was quite unnerving the first time."
"I see." Brad put his palm to his forehead and
reclined against the couch back. His stomach churned with
nervous tension as his reeled from the news that Gatewood's
story might not be as wild a goose as Wheeler had portrayed.
There was all the evidence, Gatewood and his wife's stories,
Ralston's confession, and Melanie's contact. But how could
he convince Wheeler?
Something clicked in the back of Brad's mind. What had
Wheeler said about bevieling in aliens? "Listen, Melanie,
I've got to think about my next move. This is all very
confusing, but I'm not letting it go, yet. Can you forgive
me for not trusting you?"
A short pause and Brad could see Melanie smiling in his
mind. He envisioned her flipping her long, blonde curls
over her shoulder, and twisting the phone cord around her
finger. "Yes... I forgive you."
"I may be back in Vegas in the next few days, can I
call you?"
"Yes."
Brad had to say good-bye; he had things to sort out,
things to do, but he didn't want to let her go. "Melanie,
how did you get my phone number?"
"I guessed."
Brad laughed lightly. "You're good. No doubt about
it."
"I bet you say that to all the girls," returned
Melanie, then she hung-up.
Brad set down the receiver, and his mind immediately
went into a tornado of thought. He paced the floor
nervously. He knew what he had to do. Wheeler had even
told him. "I'll believe in aliens when one walks through my
office door," is what he said.
The only way to prove Gatewood's story was to get the
aliens out of their prison.
It sounded so simple: get the aliens out. But this
wasn't any normal prison. Even if it had been, Brad
wouldn't have had any idea how to arrange a jailbreak. It
would take a criminal mind to plan a jailbreak.
No, that's not right, thought Brad. Jails were full of
criminal minds, and very few ever escaped. To make matters
worse, this was a military base with military guards. What
he needed wasn't a criminal, but a soldier. Where was he
going to find a soldier?
What Brad needed was a mercenary: someone who would
help him regardless of the legal or political implications.
But how could he find a mercenary? Surly they weren't
listed in the whitepages between Mercado and Mercer.
Perhaps the yellow pages, under Hit Men. When it finally
hit him, Brad was amazed himself. He knew who could find
him a mercenary: Johnson, the paper's 'war correspondent,'
and he was only a phone call away.
Brad dialed the office and asked to speak to Johnson.
After several moments on hold, the other reporter answered.
"Is this really Dartmouth?"
"Yeah, you act surprised."
"Of course I'm surprised, I don't think you've said ten
words to me since you started at the Herald... you must need
a favor," jabbed Johnson.
"No, just some information. Do you know anything about
the Stealth fighter?"
"Lockheed F-117, Nellis Air Force Base, invisible to
enemy radar, a few have crashed, tested during the Panama
Invasion, said to have been highly successful in Iraq.
That's it."
"Weren't they around for a few years before the Air
Force went public?"
"Around six, maybe seven years."
"How did the Air Force keep their people from talking
about them?"
"They told them not to."
"No, seriously-- did they threaten to kill them or send
them to jail?"
"All they did was tell them it was secret and ask them
not to talk, that's how it works. Nothing diabolical or
sinister about it. When you're in the military you pick up
a few secrets here and there, but you keep them secret
because you know that's the way its got to be."
"It can't be that simple," stated Brad, "They could
sell the secrets or take their information public and be
heroes."
"Heroes in who's eyes? Some people would consider them
traitors. Some people are more interested in patriotism
then payment. Think about it, how much is it worth to sell
out your country, to hand over facts that could cost the
lives of your brothers, sons, or friends. Would twenty-five
thousand cover it? Is American freedom worth a briefcase of
cash to you?"
"I understand all that, but I'm not talking about
anything that big..."
"The Stealth project is one of the biggest military
secrets to come along in two decades," interrupted Johnson.
"Look, it's like this, there are two kinds of people in the
military: short-term enlistees and career military. If you
have a secret project, use only career people who have
already re-enlisted twice. They're usually not that
concerned about getting rich, or they would have already
entered the private sector. What surprised me was how well
the civilians who had designed, tested, and built the planes
kept it a secret. Usually it's the civilian contractors who
have the security leaks."
"Let me ask you one more question, and I'll let you go.
Where could I find a mercenary?"
"A mercenary," laughed Johnson, "What do you want a
mercenary for, Mr. White Knight of Freedom of Speech?"
Brad ignored Johnson's insult. "I need to interview
him in connection with a story I'm working on."
"What story?"
"You can read about it on the front page."
"Ohhh..." moaned Johnson, sarcastically. "What skills
do you want this guy to have?"
"What do you mean?"
"You want a frogman, explosives expert, sniper, recon-
man, jungle warfare, what?"
"He's got to be able to sneak around, I guess."
answered Brad.
"You gonna try to get a picture of a Stealth fighter?
It's not worth it, everybody knows what they look like.
They even take them to air shows and display them under
armed guard. The only scoop you could get would be to steal
one, but there probably aren't but a couple hundred men who
could fly it out."
"It has nothing to do with Stealth fighters," quipped
Brad, snottily.
"Okay. There's a bar called The Perro Negro. It's in
a bad part of town, but it's where you'll find your man.
Ask the bartender for Carl Asher, tell him Johnson sent you.
If you don't, he'll figure you're a Fed."
"Why?"
"You look like a Fed."
"What's a Fed look like?"
"You."
Brad brushed off Johnson's second insult as the price
of doing business. "This guy Asher, is he any good?"
"Did you read the piece I did about the U.S. smuggling
Stinger missiles to the Afghan rebels?"
"No," lied Brad. Johnson's coverage of the War in
Afghanistan was legendary, and that story had earned him the
respect of every journalist in town, if not the nation.
"Well, Asher helped me get passed the Soviet border
patrols. He's the best foot soldier money can buy."
Brad took down the address and thanked Johnson for the
information. He decided that it was far too early to hope
to find anyone in a bar, and wondered what to do to pass the
time. He looked at the bottle of vodka on the table.
What the hell, he'd go ahead and finish it.
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