“Everyone take a seat and pull out the files laid in front of you and we will get started.” All the employees in black suits followed the instructions as their leader walked into the conference room, closing the door behind him. One of the employees switched on an overhead projector and a presentation began to display on the board in front of them.
“My name is Agent Garret, the lead investigator for this group. As you all know, a Boeing 777-200 Freight-type aircraft, similar to that of the Long-Range passenger variant, which was operated by FedEx went off radar just under 24 hours ago.”
The slide on the presentation switched to a moving image of a radar. On the radar were flights from that evening going their separate ways. After about 10 seconds, one of the flights disappears from the radar and fails to reappear.
“The NTSB were deployed shortly after and emergency crews searched for wreckage. The catch: there was no wreckage found anywhere nearby. So far police from the state of Kansas, where the aircraft was last seen by radar, have reported there is not any wreckage anywhere they can see. They have used helicopters to scan the area but there seemed to be no wreckage in the state.”
The other people at the table looked puzzled. Surely if an aircraft went off radar and did not come back, it should have crashed somewhere right?
“This is where we get to our part in this investigation. The FBI has put us on the case for a reason, and I’ll explain that to you now.” The slide on the presentation switched to an image of a strange device coated in shiny metal plating.
“The pilots and FedEx believed this was a routine cargo flight. However, this was not the case. For reasons I do not fully understand, some government scientists were shipping an experimental device on this plane to Orlando, where it was supposed to be handed over to NASA. Many of you, or most likely all of you, do not know what this device is.”
The other employees looked at each other shrugging shoulders, obviously not knowing what this device was.
“A few years ago, some testing was being done out in the desert near Edwards AFB. Aircraft were being tested with a device technicians were researching for a new type of weather radar. The device is supposed to be able to improve current radar for better heavy storm avoidance at 30,000 feet. On this particular day, they were testing a version of this new radar that was designed for researching weather phenomena. The test plane flew into a mass of clouds and its instruments started to go wacky. The scientists told the plane to land to make sure everything was running normally. About a minute after acknowledging the request, the transmitters from the radar device went crazy. A witness there reported the electronic graphs were going off the scales. The pilot radioed through saying he was encountering what seemed to be some freak storm that popped up out of nowhere. He reported that he was trying to descend out of the cloud cover so he could land. Before the aircraft made it out of the clouds, however, a large bolt of what the pilot described as ‘blue-tinged lightning’ hit it. At the exact moment the pilot reported the lightning, his radio transmission stopped and his aircraft dropped from radar. The control room personnel could not figure out exactly what had happened until the aircraft suddenly reappeared about 10 seconds after it disappeared from the radar. The pilot reported he was going into a steep descent to exit the clouds as fast as safely possible. The plane exited the large clouds shortly, after, and landed.
The presentation slide moved to one of a line graph from a computer, with the date of the weather radar test printed in black at the top right corner. The line on the graph stayed low until it seemed to skyrocket off the top of the graph’s grid.
“This is one of the graphs recorded the day of that test. The point where the line takes off is just before the pilot reported himself in a huge storm that no one had any indication of.”
One of the men seated at the conference table raised his hand.
“Yes Agent Johansen?”
“What was found from the debriefing of the pilot and analysis of the data collected that day?”
Garret nodded his head, “I was just about to get to that.” He turned back to the presentation and moved the slide forward to a picture of the metallic box, only it was opened up to view the circuitry inside.
“This is the radar device. After collection and analysis of the data and descriptions from the pilot, the scientists concluded that the radar device somehow interacted with an unknown field that surrounds the planet and started some invisible storm that day. As this was only a hypothesis, there were some that did not believe such an idea, like early chemists theories on the atom. The issue seemed to disappear into thin air as if resolved, however it was far from that. As you are all high ranking agents I now get to the information that only you are allowed to know at this time. The issue only seemed to disappear because the military labeled it as Classified and Top Secret information.”
Most of the agents merely sat there waiting for Agent Garret to continue, while some agents had significantly wider eyes.
He continued on, “The project was taken to a military base with a classified location that I do not even know of. There scientists continued work and research on the radar device they named Gale I. After a few more years of research they developed Gale II, which was put through a similar test to Gale I. A near match of the first test was performed. The test plane with Gale II flew into a mass of clouds and later the data readings for the device lit up with the pilot reporting a huge storm that ‘Came out of nowhere.’ This time however the pilots diverted immediately out of the storm as per the instructions given by the scientists before the test had started. Further research found that the system that Gale I and II used for radar, emitted some special wave that started the phenomenon each time it flew into a dense enough cloud cover.”
The same agent as before raised his hand again.
“Yes, what is it now Agent Johansen?”
“You said that in the first test of Gale I, the aircraft went missing for about 10 seconds. What did the test pilot say happened during those 10 seconds?”
Garret nodded his head and began to explain. “The test pilot reported to have gone into some sort of weird limbo. He described it as if he was stuck in-between some portal in a science fiction movie. I had not told you this already because the scientists dismissed that as the pilot blanking out for a moment and seeing some sort of dream. However, a group of the scientists researched this further and came up with a hypothesis about this field possibly having a connection to some other dimension. This leads us to recent events.”
The slide moved to a FedEx receipt for sending a First Class package.
“The scientists contacted head researchers of classified information at NASA. They discussed about sending them the device for testing. I do not know what the final decision breaker was, but they put it through FedEx. The device was tracked as it was delivered to be loaded on a plane for Orlando. Originally it was going to be sent on a 757 freighter yesterday, but, through some research already done, an opportunity for FedEx to save on costs came up. Apparently FedEx needed to fly cargo to Europe and they did not have an aircraft at Orlando suitable for the job. The company was going to send a 777 from Los Angeles and saw an opportunity to load the cargo that was originally going on the 757 onto that 777 instead. This 777 was the same aircraft that went missing, and the same aircraft carrying Gale I and II. Our job is to assist in figuring out where this plane went and, if we find it, help get it back to U.S. territory and get the facts on what happened. The pilots will be held for questioning to aid this investigation if found and are still alive.”
Agent Garret scanned the room looking at each of the other Agent’s faces. All of them were focused on him, waiting for instruction.
“One of the documents in front of you lays out your part in this assignment. The FBI and myself expect to hear back from each of you shortly on the progress made on your task. Inform us sooner if there is any problem that needs to be taken care of. Any questions?”
No one spoke, some Agents looking at others to interpret their thoughts on what had just been said.
“No? Then you’re dismissed. Get to work and good luck.”
The agents, including Garret, filed back into the office building to their respective workstations. Some agents began to make phone calls to other staff while some sent e-mails to recipients regarding the investigation. As Garret made it back to his office, his phone rang. He picked it up and answered.
“Agent Garrets office, who is it?”
“This is Investigator Gordon from the NTSB. I’ve got news.”
“What now?”
“One of the scientists from Edwards called.”
“What did he say?”
“One of the receivers for Gale II came online about an hour ago.”
“Wait, what?”
“They were checking the equipment apparently, all of them offline as usual then one of the graphing computers came online with the message ‘Device Connected.’”
“That's impossible unless…”
“Garret, I think your now realizing what I thought when I heard the news.”
Garret replied, “Yeah. Either it’s malfunctioning, or flight 715 is…”
There was a moment of silence as Agent Garret’s eyes widened.
“Gordon, I’ll have to call you back.”
“Why?”
“I’ve got some agents to talk to and a flight to book to Edwards. If the scientists are right about what their computer is saying, then there’s a chance flight 715 has somehow returned, no matter how crazy it sounds.”
With that, Agent Garret grabbed his coat and made his way off to gather his group of agents to take to Edwards to deal with the situation. It may take 3 hours or more to get there, but if this was really what the scientists believed it was, then it was going to be worth it.