Do you ever have one of those dreams where you’re falling and you have no control over what is happening? This was one of them. What I remember in the dream was I was back with my unit, back in my army days. I remember dreaming that I was part of a special operations unit and that we were being sent to a small island in the Southwest Pacific. There, we were going to do a parachute insertion and scout the island for enemy activities. I remember that we were in that part of the Pacific where there were hundreds of unnamed islands spread across the ocean for thousands of square miles. I remember one of my team members screaming “What is that?” And I remember getting a flashing glimpse of an unidentified aircraft closing on a collision course and then a tremendous explosion. As our aircraft was coming apart I remember being blown out of the fuselage while we were somewhere around 20,000 feet. I remember the fear I felt of falling out of control just before I passed out due to lack of oxygen. And, the very last thing I remember was that I was glad it was all just a dream.
I came awake with a start and suddenly realized I was face down in the sand and waves were washing over my legs. When I tried to raise up and every muscle in my body screamed in agony. The pain in its own sobering way made me realize I had not been dreaming… unless I still was and it was very realistic. I sat there gathering my thoughts and started looking around. There trailed out behind me washing up and down in the waves was what was left of my parachute. I didn’t remember pulling the cord so either I must have or the static line must’ve snagged on some of the debris of the airplane and was pulled out by the explosion. What was the real miracle was I was wearing my chute at all. I had found a way to use it to pad up the seats and get comfortable, so in a way I was alive because the engineers couldn’t design a decent seat. In either case I don’t remember it happening. I unclipped my parachute and found that I could stand without too much difficulty but still every bone in my body and every muscle attached to them made me feel as if I had been dropped into a running cement mixer. I finally came to the firm belief this was no dream.
The first thing I did was a quick inventory. It was going to be quick because when I went out through the skin I was in my jump suit and wearing my load bearing harness with the bare essentials of basic ammo load and survival gear. I had my knife, that was good start. I still had my 1911 and 4 magazines plus one in the gun. Not a lot to start or stop a war with but whatever happened it would sure beat throwing rocks. Add in the 10 candy bars I always carried and the 2 canteens of water and I figured I would be living high and clean while the cavalry came to the rescue.
The plan was after we jumped in and looked around, we would get out by plane. There was an abandoned Jap airstrip that intelligence said was serviceable enough for our plane to get into and out of, if the pilot was good enough or crazy enough, depending on what was happening at the moment. The only problem I saw with that kind of rescue was first, the bird was in a million pieces spread across miles of ocean. Second, we were flying under radio silence and I doubted that anyone had a chance to get out a call for help even if they wanted to. And third, I was probably 500 or more miles from where we were supposed to be. So how much rescue effort could they really engage in?
From my place on the beach I had the impression the island wasn’t that big and it was again one of those great miracles I hit it at all. A lot of ocean surrounded it. It was time to explore the situation a little better and see what I was stuck with for a temporary home. There are no real mountains on the island but there are a couple of tall hills on my end that blocked the view of what the rest of the island might be like. I drag my parachute out of the surf and spread it out to dry in the small bushes and shrubs along the beach. Also, with it stretched out and displayed on the beach it would act as a visual clue for passing aircraft that someone might be alive on the island. I headed for the hills.
It was a slow climb up what was left of volcanic rubble. Obviously, the island was what remained of what was once an active volcano that must’ve been dead for a million years. I got to the top of the tallest hill and from there I could see the rest of the island. It wasn’t much of an island as islands go. It was maybe half mile wide at the widest and possibly as long as a mile, but it would be a short mile. The makeup of the island appeared to be typical for this part of the world, consisting mainly of scrubby palms and other island type trees. Halfway down the hill I could see a stream bubbling out of the volcanic rocks. I figured that the volcanic soil captured the rain and slowly let it percolate out into a running stream. At least it looked like I wouldn’t die of thirst. I walked along the hillcrest to give me a changing view of the rest of the island and on the edge of a distant clearing I thought I saw a glint of metal. I pulled my small binoculars out of the vest pocket to get a better view and that is when I saw the wispy tendrils of smoke coming from nearby the metal. I thought maybe I am not alone.
I moved my way softly along some kind of small game trail. I saw what looked like pig tracks in the sand. With luck that meant I wouldn’t starve either. I kept moving toward the metal and the smoke. I finally could smell something burning. It was a strange smell, something that I had never smelled before. I ghosted up to the place the smoke was coming from and … well I saw something, something I never believed possible but you heard about as those kinds of stories like ghosts and goblins and other strange creatures. There were three of them and they were standing around a fire that appeared to be burning a fourth one. And behind them looking vary banged up was what could only be called their flying saucer. Before I went back to active duty I had been a jungle warfare instructor and I was pretty good in the boonies. I crawled in closer with the .45 in my hand in case I needed it.
They were talking but I couldn’t understand a word of it. I got a good look at them. They were not quite as tall as me and a lot more stocky. The legs looked short for how tall they were. They seemed to be kinda like us people but different ya know. They had really long arms. They were in some kind of one piece suit with boots, but the thing that really leaped out at me was they had 6 fingers on each hand and what looked like thumbs just like mine, you know, on the other side of the hand. They also had weird flat looking hair. It had to be 90 degrees and they seemed like they really hated the heat. It was taking something out of them, or so it seemed. Their faces, well they looked strange, maybe oriental like but they still could have walked down the street and just by looking at the face it’s not like you would know they were from another world.
I watched them for a while and after they pretty well burned up their dead friend they gathered up what had to be tools and went back to work on their ship. Now I had some thinking to do. I believed they were the ones responsible for crashing into my plane but I also had to believe that they wouldn’t have done it on purpose since they crashed just like we did, only their plane looked in a lot better shape. It didn’t appear like they were going anywhere soon so I pulled back and went to my side of the hill where my chute was still stretched out and was now dry. I figured I would give it a day to see if anyone came along to try to find me and if not, I was going back to find them… and see what they were up to.
I slept the night under my chute as a rainstorm blew in and pretty well drenched the place. I was able to get a good night’s sleep because even if they tried to look for me the weather had night vision down to arms length, so unless they stepped on me I was gonna be OK.
After a breakfast of a tropical Hershey bar I decided to check on the aliens. This time I went to them on a different route in case they had accidentally found my tracks or sign outside of their site and they were waiting for me or with a surprise. I managed to circle all the way around their camp and they were hard at work working on their flying saucer. I came through a thicket of low scrub and got to within about 50 feet of them and watched. They had no clue anyone else was on the island. They never looked around to se if anyone was watching them. I don’t know what they did during the night but the broken and crushed in part of the saucer seemed to have been hammered out and repaired somehow and now they were working in the area that must have been the engine or something that made it go.
I had another decision to make. I could hide like I had been doing and leave them alone. Then I figured they would be gone soon and I could try to get rescued. But, then I looked that their aircraft and thought that if we had it and could learn how to build them we would be able to control the air and that means the world as well. I waited until they took a break and looked like they were having their lunch of some form of greenish looking food substance. They were away from their tools and just sitting on the ground talking. I rose up quietly and they didn’t even see me move. I took a deep breath and kept my .45 by my side in my right hand and stepped into the clearing and waved at them with my left and said “Hi.”
The response was immediate. The two closest creatures gave a growl and ran at me, and it wasn’t to shake my hand. I brought up the .45 and shot them both. They may have been from outer space but they died just like us when that big bullet hit them. The 3rd one, the one that looked a little older just sat and never moved. I made sure the other 2 were really dead. Slowly the creature raised his hands in what must be a universal action of surrender or submission. He, I later came to know it was a male, tried several conversations with me I recognized as Earth languages, French, German, Spanish, none of which I knew and he finally said in a very parsed and halting English “Please do not kill me.” I noticed that at each language attempt he would touch a metallic collar he was wearing around his neck. I nodded to him and said “I can understand you. Now who or what the hell are you?”
He told me to call him Blex and that he was from a planet that was in the galaxy we call the Milky Way. It was located many billions of earth miles away and his star system was too distant to see even with the most powerful of earth instruments. He explained that he was glad that I had managed to kill the two who attacked me because if I hadn’t they would have killed me. They were guards who would kill anyone or anything that threatened their mission, including Blex. Blex on the other hand was a sort of scientist person who was to file a report on the planet. He explained that his people were parasites that preyed on other worlds. His mission was to explore the capabilities of a planet to defend itself if attacked or to see if the inhabatants were susceptible to a less destructive type of invasion.
He explained that if the decision was that there could be planetary destruction because of the inhabitant’s weapons, then trickery and deceit would be used to infiltrate a planet with an outpouring of gifts and technology until they had their people in place so that the planets defenses could be defeated. They would even recruit the planet’s own people with promises of great riches to make them appear less dangerous to the planet but it always ended the same, with destruction and slavery or treachery and slavery. They would hide attack ships out behind moons and planets until too late to detect them or stop them. He told me all this because he said he despised his people who destroyed great civilizations in their conquests. He told me about civilizations that had no wars or strife that had reached almost pure perfection in thought and where those inhabitants were slaughtered in the billions because they had no weapons of war.
He explained to me that there are hundreds of planets in the universe with the ability to travel interstellar space. Most of them who come to our planet are just observers who have no intention of helping or harming as the earth people are considered barbarians by most standards. They watch and wonder how we keep on existing. Others are like his planet, warlike and aggressive to worlds that can be conquered.
My head hurt. It was way too much information for me to take in. I asked Blex how his ship repairs were coming. He explained that the collision with the airplane had rendered the ship incapable of flight. It failed in the pressure testing after they repaired it and they were not having any luck with any of the communications devices. And he said any future repairs were not needed since he had no plans on reporting back now since his watchers were dead.
He seemed to be getting tired and he told me that the heat was causing him problems. Also, he was sure that he was dying. I asked why and he said that since they crashed they had been forced to breathe Earths oxygen. Breathing Earths oxygen meant he was taking in who knew what kind of foreign microbes and bacteria and virus. He told me that it was imperative that I warn my planet. His not returning would only delay them and it didn’t matter how long. Their arrival was as inevitable as death is to all creatures across the universe. If Earth’s people did not ready themselves they too would be crushed by them eventually. He said that he had seen the power of Earth weapons and while primitive they would still cause so much destruction that it would render a lot of what they come for, the water and resources unusable for their purposes. He said he was very sick and getting tired and could I let him sleep. His last words to me were “Take care. When they come they will come posing as wanting to be friends and engage in trade, but if you do you will be trading nothing but your lives and freedom.” Then he lay down and went what looked to be sleep.
I kept watch over him all night long and at some time during the night he gave a long sigh and then he was still. I checked and he was dead. I spent the next day burying them all. We never got a chance to talk about religion or God or what they might have believed. But, he was so fervent and concerned about saving us I figured it couldn’t hurt to mark his grave so I made a cross and said a few words over him. I checked out their craft but I could make nothing out of the markings or other things about it. It is just something not of this earth.
I have never seen any kind of aircraft that looked to be on a search mission. When I sent this message I have been on the island over 5 years now. If I am dreaming I wish I could wake up, but I know it is not a dream. As I find a container I scratch out a message sending it hoping that the world learns before it is too late.
If you are reading this it means at last one of my hundreds of messages I cast into the sea has finally been found. Have the Army check their records for the mission called Operation Gretta, it will give them a place to start to find me as we were on the planned route when we were crashed into. I am on one of those little tiny forgotten islands along the route. Tell them I have tried to save the saucer from the elements as best as I can but hurricanes and rains have caused problems with that process. Having no form of communication I can only wonder who won and what the world is like now. Whoever you are, what ever you do, get this information to who ever is in authority now in the world. We are going to be invaded and we must prepare.
Sgt. Gary Thompson, U.S. Army serial number 1358273
Assigned to special operations code name Gretta
Somewhere in the South Pacific, now in the year 1948… I think.
What year is it?
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