Area 51 Read Free Page A

like the idea of having to pay Franklin for photos he could take himself. Plus what if they spotted something happening? He had noted Franklin stuffing a camera into his backpack when they were leaving earlier in the day. Simmons understood Franklin's scam: he wanted exclusive footage if anything happened and he wanted to make extra money selling his own photos.
    Simmons handed his camera to the younger man, who locked it in the back of the truck. Franklin grinned, his teeth reflecting the bright moon hanging overhead.
    "Ready?"

    "Ready," Simmons acknowledged.

    "Let's do it." Franklin took a few deep breaths, then headed for a cut in the steep mountainside and began striding up. Simmons followed, his boots making a surprisingly loud clatter in the darkness as he scrambled up the loose rock.

    "Think we were spotted?" Simmons asked.

    Franklin shrugged, the gesture lost in the dark. "Well, we know the sensors didn't pick us up. If there was a camo dude out there in the dark and he saw my truck going down the road, then the sheriff will be here in about a half hour. We'll see the lights from above. The camo dudes, who are the outer perimeter security people for the complex, will drive by on this side of the ridge, maybe even come up prior to showtime if they saw we had cameras, another good reason not to bring them. The fact we haven't seen anyone yet means there's a good chance we weren't spotted. If we weren't spotted, then we can spend the whole night up top without getting hassled."

    "Doesn't the Air Force get pissed at you for messing with their equipment?" Simmons asked as Franklin led the way.

    "Don't know." Franklin giggled again, the sound irritating Simmons. "I imagine they would if they knew it was me. But they don't, so screw 'em. We're still on public land and will be the whole way," Franklin explained, slowing a bit when he recognized his paying guest's more modest pace. "But if the sheriff comes here, he'll confiscate the film anyway, so it's easier to simply not haul the weight up. Plus, we got us sort of a gentleman's agreement. This is the only spot left in the public domain that you can see the runway from since the Air Force purchased most of the northeast section last year. Most people stay back at the mailbox because they don't want to get hassled, but we aren't doing anything illegal by climbing this mountain.

    "But soon it won't be legal to come here," Franklin continued. "The Air Force is trying to get this land too. Once they get it you won't be able to see into the lake bed from anywhere in the public domain. And you sure as hell can't overfly this place.

    "Earlier this year they seized a bunch of the land over that way Franklin pointed to the north from the Bureau of Land Management, which had control of it. I used to watch from there occasionally."

    Franklin gave Simmons a hand as they made it over the lip of the cut onto the side of the ridge proper. "They wanted it all, but the law says that over a certain acreage, there have to be hearings, so the Air Force seized up to their limit the last couple of years and they'll probably do it again this year, until they get all they want, piece by piece."

    Simmons would have liked to ask a few more questions but he was too winded to do anything but grunt.

    "We have another eight hundred feet of altitude to make," Franklin said.

    THE CUBE, AREA 51
    T-143 HOURS, 37 MINUTES

    The underground room measured eighty by a hundred fee and could only be reached from the massive hangars cut into the side of Groom Mountain above via a large freight elevator. It was called the Cube by those who worked in it-the only ones who actually knew of its existence other than the members of Majic-12, the oversight committee for the whole project at Dreamland. Cube was easier on the tongue than the room's formal designation, Command and Control Central, or even the official shortened form: C3, or C cubed.
    "We've got two hot ones in sector alpha four," one of the men