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// Chapter 1: First Contact in The Cage 
// Story: Breach 
// by Milk Mind 
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	For years I knew of a phenomena that occurred on this planet. I am among one of the few who helped those in need and, in turn, survived the aftermath. That does not, however, excuse me from what I did. There were always sightings of them, but nobody believed them, those that did were just called crazy and let wear their tinfoil hats. And they’re smart to wear their hats, because we did track down aliens, and we did capture them, and we did learn from them. Too bad we learned too late.

        My part in this wasn’t very interesting, I wasn’t important, so this isn’t my story. This is the story of the events that led to the destruction of the most powerful nation on the face of the planet. It began in the facility known as Area 69. Yea, real funny. But while you sit there and laugh at that, just remember how many lives were lost because of that base. “How many” you ask? All of them.

        Area 69 was originally intended as a subterranean atomic testing ground, they blew up underground bombs. Massive portions of the base were destroyed on a regular basis. Keep in mind that that was back during the big commie scare from ‘57 to ‘67. We thought the Russians were about to launch missiles at us. We were told that every day, so what did we do? We said “So if they drop bombs from the sky, we’ll just blow up the crust of the whole planet!” Because that’s a good idea.

        Basically, after we couldn’t make those kinds of weapons anymore, there was no need for such a big place that was so open and spacious. It was empty for twenty years, until we found one. The first real live alien. I remember the date, how could I forget? September first, 1997.

        Like I said, we’ve seen them before, at least we’ve had reports. Four legs, big head, big eyes, always with some sort of bruises or cuts on them. The first was spotted by a Jewish man at the Buchenwald concentration camp in early April of 1945. Second was some time in the early fifties, this time right in the middle of an American town. Some little place in Georgia, found dead. Locals probably saw it and beat the hell outa the poor thing. Then they started getting more common. Every five years since 1960 they’ve been found like clockwork. All four legged, all different colors, each had a different mark on the back legs, and all dead.

        The alien was still alive this time, and in good condition for coming from another planet and all. It was purple, big eyes, four legs. Like the rest but with a different color. We hadn’t been able to figure out anything about them other than their bone structure, and that they were very similar to us as far as general biology went. Breath the same air, same blood, eat almost the same food with the strange exception of meat. They were herbivores, but that didn't mean they weren’t hostile.

        By the time we’d brought the thing into the base, it was already in a sort of straight jacket and locked up inside a stainless steel containment box with holes drilled into the side. There was a door on the front that would fall to the floor, but only after unlocking six combination locks, each with it’s own special combo. It had also been given a sedative to keep it sleeping. They took it to the center of the base, over five hundred feet under the surface of the Earth. There was a room there that functioned as a maximum security cell, meant to hold a single ‘subject’. Electrified barbed wire on the inside, not enough to kill but enough to harm, an army of guards with rifles at the ready at all times, and a special room elsewhere in the base, that with the press of a button, would ignite the entire room in under a tenth of a second.

        They set the box in the cell and unlocked the box, the soldiers outside were careful to keep a steady aim at the alien in case it was just waiting for an opportunity. Inside the hundred square foot cell was a single scientist and two United States Marines, gripping their M-16’s in anticipation. The scientist, one Doctor Gottschalk held a digital camera in one hand and a syringe in the other.

        Gottschalk was an American born to German parents, which would have been fine if he hadn’t been born in 1943. Gottschalk was a genius, and he knew it as well as everyone on the base, and he wasn't modest about it. He quickly spun the dials on the locks and let the door fall to the ground with a heavy, metallic ‘clank’, eager to see the new toy his little soldier boys had brought him. He was still under strict orders, but he was almost sure that what he was seeing would be on an autopsy table within the next hour. He ordered one of the marines to drag the specimen into the center of the cell, the box being at the entrance.

        After setting the purple creature into the center of the room, the marines closed the door behind them and kept their sights on the alien as Gottschalk examined it. He, with a glove on of course, felt the creature's body to try and determine more about it. He found that the purple color was given by fur, like the coat of a dog. He opened the eyelids and snapped a picture of its eye for later research. He took pictures of the distinct marking on its hind leg. A sort of magenta star by the look of it. It had a horn that protruded from its forehead. After being satisfied with the pictures of it, he slid the camera into his lab coat and readied the syringe of clear liquid. He made sure there was no blockage, squeezing a bit of it into the air, and injected the serum into the creatures leg.

        More marines entered the room affectionately called ‘The Cage’ as the creature began to move around in its jacket. The marines began to get anxious, but the doctor was more excited than anxious. He was about to see a real alien in action. Forty-four years of dedicated study of supposed aliens, thirty-four years in this base and he was finally going to see a real alien. It probably wouldn’t do anything they could understand, it probably communicated in some non-verbal way. On the other hand, there was no way it could have been some alien animal, showing features of a soldier, such as a rank marking. Gottschalk was beginning to rethink the autopsy table, but stepped back a bit to give the marines a better shot.

        The creature wiggled in it’s bindings, then opened its eyes. Its eyes opened wide as baseballs, then shrunk to the size of pinpricks. Its eyes and head moved around erratically, trying to take in its new surroundings. It calmed itself a bit after finding that no one was necessarily causing it harm. It sat, hind legs on the ground, and forelegs in the air, held together by the white multi-belted jacket. It’s head had been left uncovered in case it could communicate.

        The Doctor stood, waiting for it to make the first move. The marines kept their arms trained on it. Doctor Gottschalk finally broke the deadly silence.

“Hello. Welcome to The Cage friend.” He said, not really expecting it to reply.

“W...w-where am I?”

        The Doctor, along with the marines, was shocked. They couldn’t have expected it to speak in the same way they did, and especially couldn’t have expected it to speak English. Everyone in The Cage, with the exception of the purple alien was speechless.

“Where am I?!”