Secrets

"Not all" said one of the airforce officers hesitantly. "One died shortly after landing in what appeared to be some sort of escape pod. A rattlesnake bit him. Bad luck really."

"At least we know of at least two things that will kill them," said Benson grimly. "And in time perhaps we can find out more." And with those words Benson looked around the room at each person in turn and everyone was in agreement.

"It will be kept top secret. Even the president will not know of this"

"Even the president?" said Moresby looking bewildered. "He’s the commander in chief of the armed forces for God’s sake!"

"Presidents come and go. This project will stay, as will the government departments that run it. It must be kept top secret. Not just now but possibly fifty years from now as piece by piece we learn things from this craft. Don’t you understand? Every piece of this needs to be analysed bit by bit. Studied piece by piece. Whole industries can be created just as soon as we can figure out what the little silvery discs do. Don’t you see that!. And what do the small square electronic things look like under microscopes? What do they do? How can their computers be so tiny? What drives this thing? Think what we can learn!" he said, looking around the room at all the tired faces as he let that knowledge sink in.

"And don’t forget this too gentlemen, if they send out a search team they won’t find anything. They may find us and think we are primitives, and compared to their technology we probably are, but if they do not find anything, anything at all, there is a good chance they may leave us alone. It gives us time to prepare."

"Prepare for what?" asked Miss Blanchette.

"For their eventual return."

Finally, Benson knew they all were in agreement and he called the meeting to order.

"Gentlemen -- Ladies, we will rest now and go on with this meeting later today. I believe that we all know what needs to be done and we should start the wheels turning immediately. Funding is no problem because there are enough government departments represented here to build a dozen secret sites. All we have to do now is pray that we have time to hide everything. So, let’s adjourn the meeting until later today and all of us try and get some rest."

"I have one or two final questions, if you don’t mind me asking Mr. Benson. Where is the actual crash site? Do we know the name of the place? And what about the local people, won’t anyone there talk about what they saw?" she asked candidly.

"Yes Miss Blanchette. We know the place. It’s quite possible there will be some media hype to begin with. Townsfolk will talk about what happened. Say strange things. But it will all blow over in a week or two, mark my words, and if it doesn’t we’ll add our own misinformation, and spread our own stories. No one will be able to tell the truth from fiction. Mark my words. In six month’s time no one will even remember the name of this place."

"Where exactly is this place?" she asked quizzically

"It’s near a little town called Roswell."