“So let me get this straight…”
The atmosphere of the Miami Airbase briefing room could be cut with a butter knife as several officers – None ranking lower than Captain – stared down Charles.
The man who had spoken was a tall, slender man in his late fifties. As he paced, medals could be heard clinking together quietly as they dangled from the left coat pocket, while a full complement of ribbons adorned the entire right side if his chest up to his shoulder. Small metal eagles, each shined to a brilliant silver took their perches on both shoulders and one above the ribbons.
Rubbing his short grey hair, he continued with a sharp exhale.
"Your squadron leader, Major Allen, has disappeared with a one hundred and eighty million dollar aircraft, and nobody knows where he could possibly be."
Colonel Rave rubbed his hair again, staring daggers into Charles' eyes.
"Is that correct to assume, Lieutenant?"
Charles stood from his seated position around the table, ready to give his statement.
"Gentlemen," he began, "I understand that there is cause for suspicion here."
Several officers shifted in their seats while Rave took his seat at the head of the long conference table.
Charles continued, mainly focused on the Colonel himself.
"But everything I know, everything that transpired there, everything that was recorded from the entire flight has been laid out and studied thoroughly by this committee. I played no part in the disappearance of my squadron leader, nor do I have anything to gain by said disappearance."
"Lieutenant," one of the officers interrupted. "You mentioned a storm, and... black lightning?"
Charles nodded. "Yes sir. However, the Doppler radar was showing nothing. The AESA however-"
"What we're here to discuss," Colonel Rave interrupted, "is what happened to your flight leader and why you left his wing shortly before he disappeared."
Charles narrowed his eyes barely managing not to clench his fists.
"Due to the fact that you clearly left his wing with no recorded order having been given, I am forced to level the maximum sentence-"
Rave's sentence was interrupted by the violent opening of the Briefing room door. A rather short man sporting a Technical Sergeant insignia burst into the room, carrying a folder. He stumbled to a stop, his hat falling to the floor. Not bothering to pick it up, he popped a quick salute, apparently just now realizing he was in the presence of no less than ten officers.
"Sergeant McGuire," Rave acknowledged. "What brings you here?"
"W-Well sir," McGuire began, " I have the reports from Lieutenant Harraland's black box."
Rave nodded, motioning with his hand for the Sergeant to bring the folder forward. Charles' heart was pounding itself free of his ribcage, praying the report would show that Allen had in fact given him permission to return to base while he went ahead. He really didn't want to be flying a desk for the next few months or worse, be behind bars.
As he handed the folder to Rave, McGuire turned and nodded to Charles. Nodding back, he shook his hand as he passed. Rave, looking over the file, raised his eyebrows and seemed to linger over a certain sentence. Without looking up, his eyes looked up to Charles while a grin slowly took the place of his thin monotone expression.
"Well." Rave quipped. "It seems I was wrong in assuming you had left your squadron leader out of spite."
Several murmurs around the table caused Charles to become a little more nervous than relieved.
"However, until a thorough investigation disproves any act of sabotage, martyrdom, or desertion, your flight will remain confined to this base."
Charles exhaled a breath he didn't know he was holding.
"You will be allowed flight time not to exceed fifteen hours weekly until this is all resolved, and you will not be allowed any weaponry to be carried on your aircraft."
Charles stood still, not daring to press his luck.
"As for Allen," Rave sighed, placing the folder down on the table slowly, "he will be presumed AWOL until any proof otherwise can be brought forward."
Rave stood, taking a mess of papers and straightening them on the table. He looked at Charles, nodding.
"This meeting is adjourned."
________________________________________________________________________
It wasn’t for another six hours that Charles had the appetite for any type of food. He had spent his time calling everyone he knew who would possibly know where Allen had gone. With his skill in that fighter, he could’ve landed it in his backyard if need be. However, the lack of any evidence to his whereabouts proved troublesome. There was no distress signal, no bailout emergency alerts, and strangely enough, absolutely no GPS hits since his disappearance.
These thoughts plagued Charles' mind throughout the rest of the night, leaving him in a state of worry unknown to most men. Allen wasn't just his squadron leader, he was his mentor and brother. He had saved Charles more times than he could count, and took the heat for most of his mistakes.
He looked over the silver bar on his dress hat, rubbing it with his thumb. He knew that without Allen, his dreams of becoming a fighter pilot would never have come true. He had been there from the start, always by his side and always the one to help. But now, he was either lost, dead, or had defected.
He couldn’t believe it. After everything they’ve done and been through together, Allen had just taken his plane and disappeared? Impossible.
He sat up, turning on the lamp next to the bed. Unable to sleep, he got up and sat at the small desk at the foot of the bed. Leaning back in the chair, he stared at the ceiling, going over every possible explanation for his squadron leader’s disappearance.
Just as he delved into thought, there was a knock at his room’s door. Looking at the clock, which read 01:09, he rolled his tired eyes and got up to see who it was.
“Who the hell is knocking on the door at this time…”
He opened it, revealing two large men in stark black suits, complete with clear earpieces and smooth satin ties.
Charles stared at them for a few seconds before chuckling.
“You guys get paid to wear sunglasses at zero dark thirty?”
The men looked at each other, then back to Charles.
“Lieutenant Harraland?” One of the Suits asked.
Charles nodded, his mood dimmed by the seriousness of the Suit’s voice.
“We need you to come with us.”
Charles raised an eyebrow and scratched his blonde hair.
“Dude, I haven’t slept in-”
“Now.”
Charles flinched as they both grabbed each of his upper arms, pulling him into and down the hall.
________________________________________________________________________
The roar of jet engines echoed through Ramstein Air Base as squadrons of F-15s and Panavia Tornados took off for their first morning patrols. The Airmen and Officers of the base were on their daily routines, running the base smooth as a clock. Among the ant-like inhabitants of the base, two men walked through the halls, sporting satin black flight suits and large, abnormal helmets. They moved silently through the halls, weaving in and out of airmen and other base personnel.
Arriving at a sealed off section of the base, they used a keycard to open doors from therein. They passed several unoccupied rooms, twisting and turning through the maze of dead silent halls. The only noises were the soft padding of boots on carpet and the occasional jet engine from outside.
As the leader of the duo approached a large double door, the follower stopped. The leader, noticing the lack of noise from behind, stopped and looked at the other.
"Gary, what's up?" The leader asked.
"Nothing," Gary replied. "I'm just a little skeptical of the bullshit they fed us about Allen going rouge."
"Gary, you know our squadron leader. He'd never turn his back on us."
Gary nodded, adjusting his helmet in his arms. "Sorry Vince. I guess I'm just a little rattled from the news still."
Vince walked back and put his gloved hand on Gary's shoulder. "Come on. Let's find out what the higher ups want with us."
Nodding, Gary followed Vince past the double doors and into Ramstein’s auxiliary briefing room. As they entered, all twenty pairs of eyes fell on them, and the chatter fell instantly into a tinnitus inducing silence. Vince and Gary took their spots in the center of the room, surrounded by two crescent shaped tables with ten high ranking officers seated at each. They stood at parade rest, holding their helmets behind them.
“At ease,” one of the officers said. “You two are here for a very important task.”
As the two pilots dropped their parade rest, they both looked at the man talking. He was a Major General, and was seated at the head of the right table.
“As you are well aware, your squadron leader, Major Steven Allen, disappeared off the coast of Florida in a region known as the ‘Bermuda Triangle’.”
The two pilots nodded.
“Your squadron mate, First Lieutenant Harraland, stated that Allen went alone into a large atmospheric disturbance. But what he didn’t know was that there was an AWACS, Callsign 'Feral' stationed eighty miles off the coast of Nassau, that had recorded the entire ordeal.”
Vince and Gary looked at each other, both with varying levels of relief and worry.
“Sir,” Vince started, “Do we know where Allen is now?”
“Captain, since his disappearance, there has been no trace of GPS tracking on his plane anywhere in the world. If he was in Russia, China or even North Korea, we’d know.”
Vince nodded, deflating a bit.
“Here is what we know so far.”
A giant screen unrolled from the ceiling, allowing a projector to cast its picture onto it. What was displayed was the view of a radar, showing a massive blip and two others that were tiny in comparison.
“What Harraland said was indeed correct. There was nothing to see on the weather radar, but something far more strange. It was only detectable through the AESA radar, showing as a massive object floating in the sky rather than a storm.”
Vince cocked his head in confusion, while Gary listened intently.
"Feral was able to record these images."
The General took a small remote, pressing a button and cycling through several images. The first, albiet a little blurry, showed bright violet storm clouds gathering in a gnarled, twisted form. The second, clearer and more focused, showed that the clouds had grown exponentially in size and deepened in color.
Gary and Vince looked at each other, worry crossing their faces. They both knew the new generation of F-35 was more than capable of handling storms like this... So why did Allen not make it?
The third image was striking to say the least. An enormous flash of black lightning, highlighted against the deep violet, was shown arcing through the clouds in a series of jagged ovals.
"Now keep in mind," the General spoke up, snapping both pilots and a few officers from their stupor, "these images were taken more than one hundred miles from the anomaly. Here is what AWACS Feral was picking up on radar during the time these images were taken."
The screen separated into two halves, the left returning to the first photograph, while the right displayed the radar imagery. The first was quite large. Easily fifty miles by the looks of the scale provided in the bottom right. The second image, along with the accompanying radar scale, was astonishingly larger. In the span of minutes, the storm had more than doubled its size.
Several murmurs around the tables made Gary look around, noticing all eyes were still on them. Were they silently laying the blame on them?
Gary gripped his helmet harder, feeling eyes boring into him from all sides. As good as he was in the air, he never fully embraced the attention that came with it. From his early air shows to the rookie demonstrations, he never got around the feeling of eyes always watching and judging him. He still wondered to that day why he was chosen to fly the newest and best fighter the United States had to offer.
He looked back to the screen, which now showed the third image again. The radar screen was completely filled with random contacts, seeming to match the lighting visible in the picture. It was like the lightning bolts were solid objects appearing in an instant.
“We don’t know what exactly the AWACS and its crew witnessed, but before they could line up another picture," he adjusted his thick glasses and stared at the sentence he was trying to pronounce. "They saw a bright flash emanate from the center of the cloud, and in the next five seconds, the storm had vanished along with all radar contact."
Vince and Gary were slowly putting the pieces together.
"General, did Feral have Allen on radar just before the disappearance?" Vince asked, his worry clearly accented in his voice.
"Yes, but according to the radar operators, all radar contact had ceased when the storm vanished."
Both Gary and Vince looked at each other with shock and worry.
"Sir, even if Allen had crashed, the F-35E's black box is designed to stay intact even in the most brutal of crashes."
The General looked at the pilots, his interest peaked. "...And?"
"And," Gary continued, "the black box broadcasts a distress signal in the event of a crash or malfunction. It has various failsafes that keep it active through every conceivable malfunction, all types of damage, and even if hit by the EMP of a nuclear detonation."
The General raised his hand, signaling for Gary to quiet himself.
"So you're saying, that Allen and his one hundred and eighty million dollar aircraft simply... vanished?"
Gary didn't know what to say to that. He knew it was impossible, but before today, he thought lightning only came in white.
"Sir, from what I've seen and what I've heard," Vinced chimed in, "I'm willing to believe that is exactly what happened."
The General shook his head, at a loss for words. The evidence was overwhelming, and he knew something fishy had gone on by the looks of those photos and radar readings.
Not knowing what to say, the General simply stood up and turned the projector off. The numerous officers looked at him, wondering what the old coot was going to say next.
"Gentlemen, in all my years I have never seen or heard of a situation like this. However, it is our duty to figure out just what in the hell we're gonna do about it, and bring our missing pilot home."
Gary and Vince nodded.
"So, pack your bags boys. You're heading to the Bahamas."