Secret Journey to Planet Serpo (11 page)

WE GO

Day 1
We are ready. Hard to think we finally made it. Team is motivated and calm. Final briefing by MTC and MTB. Cargo packed in EBE craft. Might have some problems with guns. Will be talking to the MVC. 899 [the security officer] and 203 [the assistant Team Commander] will have overall charge of weapons. No sync system or we don't know about them. Everything moving smoothly. 700 and 754 [the doctors] will give each member final check before boarding. OK, we loaded everything and it fits. But we have to transfer all of it to the bigger ship once we get to rendevous [
sic
] point. Really excited about this. No reservations by anyone. MTC asked all members to make final decision. The team all said go. We go. Interior of EBE craft is big. There are three levels, this is different than the one we trained on. I think that was a scout craft, this one is a shuttle craft.

We stored the cargo in lower level. We will sit in the center level and the crew will sit in the upper level. Strange looking walls. They seem to be dimensional. There are three stations, four of us will sit in each station. No seats just benches. We wouldn't fit in those small crew seats. The MVC says we don't need any
thing special, no O
2
or helmets. Don't know what to do with them. OK, final checks. MTC gave us final words. One pray [
sic
] said. We board the EBE craft. 475 [linguist #2] really nervous. 700 will watch him. The hatch is closed. No windows. We can't see out. Everyone is seated in their respective seats on the bench. No retention harnesses. OK, well, bar across us. The craft is starting engine, or what they call energy thrusters. Seems like we are moving but nothing is happening inside. Still able to write this. Really dizzy now. 102 sitting next to me and he is faint.
^*21
Something feels really funny. Have to rewrite this because I can't think straight.

When the commander says, “We loaded everything and it fits,” it may be that the actual loading was done by an Air Force ground crew, since it doesn't seem appropriate that this highly trained team would be expected to perform such arduous labor; that is, loading 90,500 pounds of equipment and supplies, although judging from the way they had been treated thus far, it wouldn't necessarily be out of the question. In fact, that may very well be what happened, since a ground crew would have to have had very high security clearances. The statement “One pray said” was probably meant to be “One prayer said” and would seem to accord with the chapel scene in
Close Encounters
where the clergyman delivers a final prayer to the team, and refers to them as “pilgrims.” Since the commander says, “Still able to write this,” it appears that, at this stage, his diary was handwritten, although we learn later that the diaries of all the other team members were recorded on cassette tape. Eventually, the commander also reverted to voice recording.

A SCREAMING MATCH

The second entry by the Team Commander on Day 1 describes the arrival at the rendezvous craft, which I will now refer to as the “mother ship,” and the beginning of the actual star voyage. Mother ship is an appropriate designation, since we learn later that it carried multiple smaller ships.

Day 1—Entry 2
We made it to the rendevous [
sic
] craft. We don't know where we are, but it seemed like we all fainted or were really confused during this trip. According to my wristwatch, it took about six hours. Or maybe more. We left at 1325 and it is 1939. But not sure of the day. We flew into the big ship. We are standing in a bay or something. There are many EBEs helping us. They seem to understand we are confused. The cargo was offloaded in one big move. The platform containing the cargo was moved without unloading the individual cargo. This ship looks like the inside of a real big building. The ceiling is about one hundred feet high in this area of the ship.

OK, we are being moved into another part of the ship. OK, we moved to another room or area. What a big ship. I just can't describe how big this is. It took us about fifteen minutes to walk to our area. Seems like it is something special for us. The chairs are bigger. But there are only ten of them. OK, I guess 203 and myself
will sit in [a] different location above these seats. We are moved by some sort of elevator, but I can't understand how it worked. Everyone is hungry. We have our backpacks containing some C-Rats and I guess we eat now. But must ask the MVC. I can't find him and we can't communicate with the two EBEs here. They seem to be real nice. 420 [linguist #1] will try to use his language skills. Almost funny. Sounds like a screaming match. We just used sign language indicating we want to eat. One of the EBE brought us a container with something it. Doesn't look good but I think it is their food. Looks like mush or oatmeal. 899 will taste it. Well, 899 said it tastes like paper. Think we will all stick to C-Rats. OK, MVC finally showed up. Told us we will begin trip soon. Two milsI think he means minutes but don't really know. Maybe it wasn't such a good idea to eat before leaving. We don't feel any weightlessness and we don't feel dizzy. But we don't know what to expect from this point on. They are indicating we must sit in the chairs.

We learn from this that the Ebens have obviously developed a type of antigravity technology that allows them to cancel out the weight of massive objects, so that they can be easily pushed into another position. There is no other explanation for how they were able to offload forty-five tons of equipment from the shuttle craft to the mother ship so quickly and effortlessly. The diary tells us that this was done in “one big move” without taking the individual items off the platform, so that means that the platform itself was moved. It's surprising that the Team Commander didn't marvel at that! A platform holding three Jeeps, ten motorcycles, six tractors, eight power generators and much more had to be very large. We learned in the previous chapter in the first entry for Day 1 in the Team Commander's diary that the cargo was loaded onto the Eben shuttle craft by the team itself or by a ground crew. In that entry, the TC said, “OK, we loaded everything and it fits. But we have to transfer all of it to the bigger ship once we get to rendezvous point . . . We stored the cargo in lower level.” So it appears that the team loaded all the supplies, equipment, and vehicles directly onto a single, movable platform within the first level of the Eben shuttle craft. Because it was all placed on one platform, the Ebens were able to just move the loaded platform onto the mother ship.

These entries in the Skipper's diary settle once and for all the speculation about how the pyramids of Egypt, Stonehenge, and all the other massive ancient megalithic archaeological sites were built (see
plate 11
). If the Ebens have this weightless technology, we can reasonably assume that it is commonly used thoughout the galaxy, and that the ancient astronauts all knew about it. The big question now is: Was the secret shared with us? If so, that means that we have probably had this capability since 1965. It absolutely boggles the mind to realize what this could mean to our Earthly industries if this technology was given to them. Certainly we could do away with cranes, and skyscrapers could be built in about half the time. The building materials could be floated up to each floor in minutes. We could conceivably have floating towns and cities. Vehicles would no longer need roadways and could zip along above the streets. If this information lies buried somewhere in Air Force vaults, then we can begin to appreciate the magnitude of the social, technological, and industrial revolutions that will occur once these secrets are revealed.

WE REALLY FELT DIZZY

The team suffered considerable discomfort during the first part of the journey, as described in the Team Commander's Day 2 entry.

Day 2
I'm not sure just how long we were in the containers. We sat in the chairs and a clear container was placed over us and the chair. We [were] isolated in this bubble or sphere. We could breath [
sic
] OK and could see out, but we really felt dizzy and confused. I think I fell asleep or fainted. I think this is another day, but my watch says one hour since we sat, but I think it is the next day. Our time instruments are located in our backpacks, which are stored in another area of this room. We are still in these spheres but it seems OK. Well, 899 figured out how to get out because he is standing up. He opened my sphere. Not sure if we should be out of
this thing. 899 said a[n] EBE came in and looked at us and left. Other team members sleeping. 899 and myself walking around this room. I retrieved the time instruments. Seems like we have been traveling about twenty-four hours or so. No windows to see. Originally we were told it would take about 270 of our days. OK, EBE came in and pointed to the chairs, I guess we need to go back and get into them.

I DREAMT OF EARTH

The following entry in the Team Commander's diary has no day associated with it, and seems to be another description of Day 2, since it gives more details of that first travel day on the mother ship. But, at this point, they are well along in the journey. The Commander is so disoriented that he doesn't realize that he has already written about this first day of travel, and covers much of the same ground. He apparently has no memory of his previous diary entry. In this section, we learn that one man is missing.

I dreamt of earth. I really had some vivid dreams of Colorado, the mountains, the snow and my family. It was if I was really there. I had no worries and never thought of my situation inside the foreign spaceship. Then I awoke. I was confused and disoriented. I was in a bowl, well, it looked like a bowl to me. I don't remember how I got here. My first thought was to my crew. I pushed open the top of this glass bowl and it opened. I heard a hissing sound coming from the seams or seals. I looked around and saw that I was inside a room. Not a room I remember. But all of us were inside these glass bowls. All the other crew members were asleep. I climbed out and realized my legs were really sore. But I climbed out and went to each glass bowl and checked on the crew. I found only eleven of us. Somebody is missing. But who? I am so confused. I'm also very thirsty. I can't find any of those water bottles. We had some but I can't find any. My eyes are really having a problem focusing. But I'm writing this in my
log, I have to record everything. I found number . . . He is alive. Who is missing[?]

The Team Commander had a vivid dream of his Colorado home.

I have to look at each bowl. This room is large. The ceiling looks like a bed mattress. The walls of this room are soft. Not very much in this room, except for the bowls and some tubes running from the bowls to the floor. I see lights flashing on the bottom of each bowl. There are bright lights on in the ceiling. Inside the mattress or something. I can't open these bowls. I've tried everything. I must get some help from the Ebens. I found a door but it won't open.

WE ARE THE SPECIMENS

I can't remember how we opened the other doors. How long have we've been in these bowls? I can't seem to remember much. Maybe the traveling in space causes problems with a person's mind. They told us this during training but we never had anyone travel this far in space before. We are the specimens. Maybe I should go back into the bowl. Maybe I awoke too early. My wristwatch says it is 1800 hours. But what day, what month, what year? How long
have I been asleep. The floor seems to be soft with wires running in a criscross pattern. I see some type of television screen in the corner of the room. I think it might monitor the other bowls. I can't read anything on the screen because it is in Eben language. I do make out likes [lines], maybe health monitoring lines on the screen. I hope that means everyone is breathing and is alive. But we are missing one man. Did I forget something? Did someone die? I can't remember. I have some type of rash on my hands. Real burning sensation. Maybe it is radiation burns from something. But where are the radiation monitors we had in our packs? Were [
sic
] are our survival packs? I can't find anything. I am returning to the bowl. I am lying down. I will stop making entries in this diary.

WE HAVE NO IDEA WHAT DAY IT IS

Entry
Since I am not sure of which day it is I won't state a day as to my entry. I'll just say entry. We are all sick. Dizzy, upset stomachs. 700 and 754 gave us medicine to settle our stomachs. But we really feel bad. We seem to be unable to focus our eyes and seem to not know which way to turn up or down and don't know the wasy [way] to sit down. Really bad feeling. Medicine helps a little. We are able to eat a little. 700 and 754 tell us to eat and drink the water we brought along we are doing that and feel a little better can't concentrate on anything so I can't rite anymore right now.

Feel a lot better. EBEs came in and did something to the room. It all seems clearer and we are not so confused and dizzy. We ate again and drink more water. Feeling a lot better. We are out of sphere, but must stay in them at certain times. EBE showed us a series of lights above the entry panel. Green, red, and white lights. If the light is red, we must sit in the sphere. If the light is white, we are OK. EBE never explained the green light. Maybe that isn't good. We have no idea what day it is, only that it is 2319. Our date recorder isn't working very well, according to 633 [scientist #1]. He thinks we have been going for 10 days, but not really sure. We have been confined to this room for the entire time. I
think this room was made for us and we are safe in this room. Maybe it wouldn't be wise to leave it. No weightlessness. Don't know how they do it. But we do feel a little lightheaded when we walk. Seems room is pressurized. Ears are popping a lot. If we have to sit in this room for 270 days we will really be bored. We can't really do much, all our equipment is packed away. We have our backpacks but they only contain a few items. We want to clean up, but can't find a bathroom except the containers we are using to relieve ourselves. They are small metal containers that are emptied by the EBE every now and then. EBE brings us food, their food. We tried it and it tastes like paper—really no taste but maybe it is something special for space travel. 700 is eating it. He seems OK but it is upsetting his bowels. Their water is milky-looking but tastes like apples. Strange.