3rd May
‘Frankly, I believe him,’ concluded Major Dwight White as he glanced north from his office window across Groom Lake.
Area 51 was due to be abandoned by the US Air Force in around five years, and Dwight had begun to wonder what would become of the base that had been his home from home for nearly thirty years.
He admired the wonderful view across the lake towards the distant mountains. This place could easily become a holiday destination. In fact, he gathered that plans had already been proposed to the USAF by a Las Vegas consortium to buy part of the area and turn it into an extraterrestrial themed adventure park.
Dwight would have preferred it to be a science and aerospace themed adventure park. He had certainly seen many breath-taking examples of both during his time as security chief at the base. Indeed, many of the aircraft were still black projects that officially did not exist.
There were, however, no extraterrestrial spacecraft.
He sometimes speculated that it would have been fun to be involved with a project to reverse engineer an alien spacecraft. Sadly, this had simply been a cover story.
‘What Leadbetter has told us fits with what we know,’ agreed Colonel John Hawker, the base commander.
‘He believes that this Swan Morrison guy has some amazing supernatural powers,’ said Dwight, beginning to summarise the outcome of Leadbetter’s initial interrogation. ‘He has renounced his Christian faith to be a disciple of “the Great Lord Morrison”, as he calls him. He thinks that Morrison has some connection with the British military or intelligence services, which we already know, and that Morrison wants him to discover the identity of Arkangel.
‘Leadbetter started this mission by kidnapping and interrogating Reginald Hunter – Leadbetter says he released Hunter and doesn’t know where he is now – then he tracked down Horatio Rycroft.’
‘Unfortunately,’ John Hawker interrupted, ‘we don’t know what Rycroft has told Leadbetter.’
‘Leadbetter says he never got the chance to interrogate him,’ Dwight replied. ‘We can’t confirm what he says because the stress of the kidnap, the stun and gas grenades and the flight back here were just too much for Rycroft’s heart. The air crew did what they could, but he was dead before they landed.’
There was a knock on the office door.
‘Come in,’ Dwight called.
Flight lieutenant Carl Rodriguez entered the room. ‘I’m planning to fly Starcruiser Two to the UK base at zero one hundred, Colonel Hawker,’ he said. ‘I’ll be undertaking the initial security configurations and calibrations for the craft. I’ll also be modelling a fully operational sortie so all systems and weapons will be live. Will you be joining me?’
John Hawker looked at his watch. ‘Yes,’ he replied. ‘How long will the flight take from here to England?’
‘At ten thousand miles per hour, Sir, about half an hour,’ the pilot responded.