Chapter 2: Fake News

“DC Air flight 1427 from New York to Kansas City disappeared from radar and radio contact at exactly noon Eastern Daylight Time. The last known location of the flight was just south of Wheeling, West Virginia,” said the news broadcast. “Search planes have been dispatched and are crisscrossing the area looking for any sign of the downed aircraft. As a precaution, Air Force fighter jets are circling the area, alert for any sign of illegal activity. If you have any information as to the whereabouts of the missing aircraft, please call the number at the bottom of your screen immediately.”

“Well, shit, baby boy. That’s your daddy’s flight. Don’t think badly of me. I’m going to drop you off at Granny and PopPop’s for a while until we get this sorted out. I might have to drive to West Virginia to identify his body,” Stacy said.

And if it was the worst, she might not come back.

The Security Council was waiting for the president when he came off the eighteenth green at his private golf course Wednesday morning. Secret Service agents surrounded him and the Middle Eastern prince he was golfing with. The president bid his guest farewell and the prince’s guards met him as they went to his motorcade.

Bob Sinclair was the only member of the Security Council the president trusted, so the others were cut off from him by the Secret Service.

“It’s time for dinner, Bob. Whatever it is, it can wait until we get inside and have food in front of us.”

“Yes, sir. Of course, sir,” Bob answered nervously, glancing at the sky. It would be better to get inside as quickly as possible. It was obvious the president wasn’t in a good mood and a glance at one of the agents got a mouthed, “He lost.” That explained things.

Once they were inside and seated at the president’s long dining table, Bob was given clearance to talk. None of the president’s family nor other advisors were present for the meal. The president’s gold plate was twice the size of Bob’s plastic one and had twice the amount of food. He started eating quickly as Bob began his story.

“Sir, it’s about the plane that went missing at noon yesterday.”

“Find the wreckage?”

“No, sir. There is no sign it disassembled. We believe it was captured by aliens.”

“Shoot it down!”

“We don’t know where they took it.”

“Get Homeland Security and Border Control on it. Deploy ICE. They’re supposed to keep illegal aliens out of our country. Don’t even say anything to the public. Divert the plane straight to El Salvador. Better yet, send them to Uganda.”

“Sir, we don’t think it was aliens from Mexico, Canada, or China. We’re talking about space aliens.”

The president spat a mouthful of food across the table as he choked out a laugh.

“Good one, Bob. That’s why I like to keep you around. You’re always entertaining.”

“I’m serious, sir,” Bob said. “A witness saw the plane overhead and said it suddenly just vanished. He was sure he could see a shadow of it as it ascended into heaven.”

“Which is it? God or aliens?” the president pounced.

“It’s the only thing that was taken today, so we have to believe God wasn’t involved. You and I wouldn’t be here if it was the rapture.”

“Right. But aliens don’t exist. It’s either Antifa or Black Lives Matter.”

“Those were five years ago, sir.”

“You can’t trust the liberals!”

“Of course not, sir. We think the threat is real.”

“Are you trying to irritate me, Bob? Get out of my dining room!”

Bob left and went to report the meeting, such as it was, to the rest of the council.

“I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. There is no such thing as space aliens,” the president posted on his social media account.

“Space aliens are a product of artificial intelligence controlled by the liberal media,” he doubled down.

“Anything you hear about space aliens is fake news. We believe CNN is at the heart of this misinformation.”

Of course, his posts were the first anyone had heard of a threat from space aliens, including CNN.

“Has the president lost it?” asked a media post, quoting the president’s messages.

By morning, though, when the country was waking up to their cell phones and looking at them through bleary eyes, the president’s posts had all been removed. The rabid discussion on the internet and in the morning news, however, was in full bloom.

“Pentagon refuses to deny invasion by space aliens!” screamed one headline.

“Air Force reportedly on alert for invasion from space.”

“No evidence,” stated a banner across responses and reposts that quoted the president’s tweets. The social media AIs worked overtime to hide the posts. Everything that talked about aliens could not be removed.

UFO Today, a publication that mimicked a national newspaper, had the most extensive article on the subject, including quotes from prominent scientists.

“We should not be surprised at the sudden furor raised about comments that seemed to indicate the president was aware of alien activity in our space. We at UFO Today have known about this activity for several years. The reluctance of the government to confirm the story, originally credited to the president in posts that have since been removed, is the same that we have encountered over the years when we attempted an investigation.

“Word that another aircraft has disappeared, this time from directly over US airspace rather than the fabled Bermuda Triangle, has sparked more rumors of alien contact. Whether these rumors are true or not, we can’t say. But the disappearance of DC Air flight 1427 has all the same hallmarks as other historic flights that have vanished without a trace.

“As early as 1932, a US troop transport plane flying from Guam to the Philippines disappeared with 90 troops on board. There was no signal from the plane and no wreckage was ever found. The crew of a Liberian tanker plying the waters on that route reported seeing an intensely luminous light in the sky. Did the plane blow up, or was it snatched by a powerful beam?

“In 1974, an unscheduled Argentine troop transport with three crew and 21 passengers disappeared. Just vanished. No trace of the aircraft or the people on it was ever found.

“Is it always people? No. The missing aircraft and ships seem to have all kinds of cultural artifacts aboard. For example, a cargo flight from Tokyo to Rio with only six people aboard disappeared without a trace. The plane vanished with 153 rare paintings valued at over $1.2 million!

“What made the Bermuda Triangle famous? The triangle extends from southern Florida, to Bermuda, to Puerto Rico. Within that region, ships with goods and passengers had long been known to disappear, but on December 5, 1945, Flight 19, a group of five Navy fighters two hours into a training mission out of Fort Lauderdale reported a compass malfunctioning and the leader was not sure where they were. All five aircraft and the fourteen men on them were never seen nor heard from again.

“A flight over Pakistan carrying 54 passengers disappeared in 1989.

“The largest search effort for a missing aircraft in history took place in 2014 when Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 disappeared without a trace on its flight from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing. It vanished from clear skies early in the morning on March second. No flashes or crew distress signals. The plane, its 239 crew and passengers, and radio signals just vanished.

So, now we add DC Air Flight 1427 from New York to Kansas City with 369 passengers and crew. Possibly the largest single abduction in history, the flight vanished over West Virginia yesterday. Is it any wonder that people—maybe even the president—speculated alien interference? An eye witness claimed the plane was overhead one moment and the next, it was gone. The plane vanished so quickly, said the witness, that for a minute it left its shadow still flying up toward the heavens.

“Perhaps the aliens responsible for this abduction are angels. And maybe this time, we’ll find out!”

Somewhere south of Wheeling, West Virginia, Harlan Graves was trying to follow the directions of the only witness to the disappearance of DC Air Flight 1427. The FAA investigator looked at the scribbled map on a diner placemat and scratched his head.

“Why couldn’t he have given me GPS coordinates?” Harlan mumbled. “There. That must be where Jim Bob’s cattle broke through the hedge back in 1999. Could he have been more cryptic? It’s the only thing I could call a hedge I’ve seen in five miles. Now, there should be a two-track lane off to the right. What the fuck was that guy doing out here anyway?”

Harlan crept forward, finally seeing what might pass for a two-track lane. It was more like two footpaths running parallel to each other, but he thought he could keep the tires of his Bronco in the worn spots. He turned in and made his way down the lane with hawthorn branches and blackberry bushes scratching along the sides. The witness had been out here right at noon, stretched out in the bed of his truck having a smoke and a little drink before he went home from work. Harlan couldn’t imagine navigating this path in the dark. The witness said he’d made the stop on his way home from the night shift at a chicken rendering plant.

All Harlan needed to find was one little scrap of anything that might look like it came off an airplane. Evidence of a crash. Then he could call in the NTSB and get them to take over the investigation. He’d tried that once already.

“You lost an airplane off of radar, but there’s no sign of a crash. You had helicopters circling the area out ten miles from the supposed site and still no evidence of a crash,” Millie MacDonald at NTSB had told him. “We investigate crashes, Harlan. Show me a goddam crash site and we’ll get right at investigating.”