The sun was beginning to sink as Dave Powell pulled his Hummer up behind Charlie Redwing's old Ford F-150. John Greyhorse walked over as Dave climbed out and shook his hand.
"Hey, Dave--thanks for coming, I appreciate it."
"Anything for an old friend like you," replied Dave. "Whatcha got? No oil wells around here, so it must be something else."
"It's something else all right," said John. "Remember that conversation we had in Pawhuska about the old radar base and Project Whatever-it-was?"
"Project Blue Book. Yeah, gosh--that's been several years ago. Why--you see a flying saucer or something?"
"Not exactly. You weren't kidding me about that radar base, were you?"
"No, I wasn't. What's going on, John?"
"Follow me."
The invisible wall was right where John had left it. Dave felt its smooth surface, then he slid his hands around. "My god," he whispered. "It really exists."
"What? What really exists?" asked John. "You know what this is?"
"If it's what I think it is," replied Dave, "it's something called an 'energy shield' or 'force field.' As far as I know, we're not even close to having the technology involved to make one."
"Energy shield? What the hell is that?"
"A kind of wall created out of energy. Science fiction authors love to write about these things. Maybe their predictions were correct."
"Come on, Dave--science fiction?"
"Sure, like the shield around the USS Enterprise on Star Trek. Don't you watch television?"
"Only when Callie makes me watch those stupid reality shows. So you're telling me that we have some kind of wall made out of energy here?"
"Maybe, although it wouldn't be a flat wall--probably a dome with some sort of generator or projector at the center." He slid his hand along the surface until it contacted the ground. Finding a stick, he dug down several inches adjacent to the surface. "Doesn't stop at ground level--keeps on going. Not just a dome--maybe a sphere."
He stepped back several yards and hurled the stick at the surface. It bounced off and fell to the ground. He retrieved the stick and hurled it at the wall as high as he could throw; again it bounced off the surface. "It's at least thirty feet high," he said. He retrieved the stick and placed its end against the surface. He slowly pushed on the stick, trying to puncture the surface, but the stick did not move. "Completely opaque--not appreciably permeable or elastic."
"Opaque? Come on, Dave--I can see right through it!" cried John.
"Opaque to matter; in other words, nothing material can get through. Because we can see through it, it's not opaque to light. Makes me wonder about the wave/particle duality theory."
"Well, theories are great," said John, "but I'm in deep doodoo here. Bartlesville Police Department had a call from"--he checked his notebook--"a Ron Colston about his wife, who was supposed to be over at the sports complex. She never got there. Judging from the time, I think that wreck is all that's left of Missus Colston and her car. It's been two hours since the police got the call, and I've been sitting on this until you got here--at some point I've got to call it in. Also, I've had the road blocked off for over an hour and people who live around here are going to start asking why. Natural gas leak is fine except that there is no natural gas in this area, and there aren't any gas company trucks around."
Dave thought for a minute. "I realize that this is a tragedy for the Colston family, but Missus Colston is going to have to go missing for awhile. If this got out, I can guarantee that there would be ten thousand people in Bartlesville inside of twenty-four hours, not counting every news agency in the world.
"Okay, John; first thing we do is, you get more deputies over here to make sure nobody gets in or out of this area; keep them at the barricades, don't let them come down here. It'll be dark pretty soon, so I don't think we have to worry about anybody wandering around this field at night, but I'll stay here just to make sure--I keep a sleeping bag in the Hummer. Keep up the story about the natural gas leak for now. We're going to have to call the federal authorities--best we do it now, because they'll be here soon enough anyway. I still have some contacts in Skyguard, so I'll make the call."

TUESDAY, JUNE 15 - 6:15 AM

Outside Betty Conkle's house, Oklahoma Gas and Electric utility trucks cruised up and down the Gap, driven by burly men in orange vests and yellow hard hats. The furniture in the front room of the house had been replaced by two eight-foot folding banquet tables and steel chairs. Stacks of metal equipment boxes were arranged around the walls. Betty herself had been hustled off to the airport where she had boarded a plane for an expense-paid surprise visit to her sister in Des Moines. Charlie had returned to Pawhuska with Zeke, and Sheriff John Greyhorse had gone home, glad to wash his hands of the whole business.
Sitting around the banquet table were four men and two women. General Richard Stuart, Director of Skyguard, entered the living room from the kitchen, carrying a fresh pot of coffee. After filling coffee cups, he put the empty pot on the table and stood at its end.
"Thank you all for being here so early this morning. I'd like to introduce you to Doctor David Powell. Why don't you go around the table and tell Dave who you are and what you do. Or rather what you're supposed to do." There were some chuckles around the table. "Sharon, let's start with you."
"I'm Sharon McGinnis, philologist, epigrapher, cartographer, and backup photographer."
"Laura Scott, photography, administration and backup communications."
"Doctor Ralph Edwards, physics and chemistry."
"Real Doctor Charles Leigh, resident sawbones and forensics, plus exobiology and geomicrobiology."
"Benny Vanetta, electronics instrumentation and communications. Also repair dude."
"Benny's also our morale officer and court jester," Sharon interjected.
"Thank you all," said Richard. "I've asked Dave to join the group because he was first on the scene, so to speak, and because he was my predecessor at Skyguard. He's the one who called me last night. Dave will act as a consultant and will work with Benny in the electronics area. Dave, bring us up to date on what you've found."
Dave briefed the group on the previous day's happenings. "I've drawn a rough sketch--obviously not to scale--of the area. Does everyone have a copy? Good. As to the Aegis--which is what I'll call this invisible wall until we come up with something better--I have only done a few preliminaries.
"Considering the unusual nature of this phenomenon, I decided to spend the night. After it got dark, I walked around the perimeter of the Aegis. I did not want to show a light, so my measurements and observations are very preliminary. It is apparently circular in shape and occupies about two-thirds of the meadow. I would guess it's about 250 feet in diameter at ground level. I dug down about two feet and determined that the surface extends underground at least that far. Considering that at least part of it is buried, I have no way of knowing how much of the Aegis is below ground level. That is, the part that's above ground may be just the tip of the iceberg, so to speak. For all we know, the Aegis may be--and probably is--a complete sphere.
"The surface of the Aegis appears to be completely transparent. I detected no reflections or light refraction, but I didn't have much light to work with. I found some flour in the house and threw a handful on the surface. None of it stuck, so it may have some kind of electrostatic property which repels small particulate matter. Sheriff Greyhorse reported that smoke from his cigar was repelled as well.
"Because of its transparency, there was no way to tell how thick the surface is; however, I looked at the soil and grass at ground level and was unable to detect any line of demarcation between the inside and outside of the Aegis. This would indicate that the surface is extremely thin--if the word thin' even applies here.
"The surface is cool and smooth. I put my ear against it but could detect no sound. Also, a good whacking with a stick generated no sound except from the stick itself; either the surface dampens the sounds or it is completely inelastic.
"Finally, I have no way of knowing how long the Aegis has been here. The owner has not been in the field since last fall and cannot recall any event out of the ordinary which might have heralded its arrival. However, foliage on the inside of the Aegis matches foliage on the outside, so my guess is that the Aegis has been there less than two days. That's all I have."
"Pardon me," said Benny. "What's an 'Aegis?'"
"Let me," said Laura. "If I remember correctly, the Aegis was the name of the shield that Zeus carried, wasn't it?"
"Very good!" Dave said, obviously pleased. "You're up on your Greek mythology."
"Thank you," Laura murmured.
"I had no idea what an 'Aegis' was either," said Richard, "but I sure as hell wasn't going to ask. It seems to be a very appropriate name. Thanks for your report, Dave--it was very comprehensive, considering you've been here less than twelve hours and most of that time was spent in the dark.
"Now to some logistics: you noticed what look like OG&E trucks driving up and down the road, compliments of our paint crew at the hangar; that is our cover for this operation. We will be repairing a ruptured natural gas line in the meadow so you will wear OG&E vests and hard hats at all times. Any questions?"
"Yes," said Dave. "What about the wreck--how are you handling that?"
"Good question," replied Richard. "At approximately seven o'clock this morning, it will be transported to another location. Sometime this afternoon, the wreck will be 'discovered' by one of Sheriff Greyhorse's deputies and the proper procedures will be followed. Any other questions? Okay, then. All our equipment has arrived, so let's get started."

TUESDAY, JUNE 15 - 1:35 PM

Seven hours had elapsed since the Skyguard team had filed out of Betty Conkle's house and into the meadow. As they reassembled at the banquet table and munched sandwiches, Richard started the reporting. "I've been on the horn with the CIA to get some high-resolution Keyhole Twelve satellite photos of the area and we're trying to get some infrared shots from one of the NOAA weather satellites. We should have those by tomorrow. Skyguard has been monitoring radio and TV traffic for any unusual news reports or cellphone conversations but so far nobody seems to be interested in our activities. Also negative on any reported local sightings or unnatural occurances within the last two weeks.
"I spent some time collecting forensics on the road and in the drainage ditch to try and determine what caused the crash. I'm not an expert, but as far as I can tell, Mrs. Colston simply lost control, swerved off the road and into the meadow, where the vehicle impacted the Aegis. The way the ground is torn up and the state of the ruts leading to the wreck indicate that she hit the brakes as the vehicle left the road.
"Judging from the state of the vehicle, she must have been traveling seventy or eighty miles per hour when she hit the Aegis. When she hit, the vehicle literally disintegrated; there was debris scattered in a wide area, none inside the Aegis. The charred grass pattern surrounding the vehicle is semicircular and is about thirty feet in diameter; of course there was no charring ahead of the vehicle because of the Aegis. We're lucky the explosion didn't start a full-blown brush fire.
"It must have been like hitting a flat concrete bridge abutment head on. And the Aegis at the impact point shows no visible or tactile signs at all--no char marks, punctures, dents, or anything else. We'll perform our own impact tests on the Aegis, but I can tell you that a four thousand pound vehicle hitting the Aegis dead on at eighty miles an hour did not affect the Aegis in any perceptible way whatsoever. Whatever that thing is, it's strong. That's all I have. Who'll go next?"
"I'll go," said Ralph Edwards, the physicist. "About all we've done is a measurement of the base and some materials testing. To measure the Aegis we used a laser rangefinder. The diameter at ground level is 310 feet, which makes the circumference 974 feet. Dave's guesstimate of 250 feet was pretty close.
"We're trying to find some kind of ribbon or tape about six inches wide which we will lay around the base so we can do a flyover and get some pictures. Right now, of course, photographs of the Aegis are meaningless since it's transparent. We won't be able to do that until tomorrow since we need a lot of tape. At some point we'll need to measure the height. If it's a hemisphere, it's height would be 155 feet, or about as high as a 13-storey building.
"As I said, we did some preliminary materials testing. The surface is impervious to corrosive acids; in fact, none of my chemicals had any effect. One important note is that all liquids applied to the surface simply slid off without leaving any trails. It's as if the liquid never quite touches the surface at all. I'll let Benny tell you about what he's done."
"Thanks, Ralph," said Benny. "Dave and I worked together on this. We placed a contact microphone on the surface and listened. Ambient noise level went to zero and stayed there; in other words, we heard nothing.
"Next, Dave held the microphone against the surface while I hit the surface with my hammer. Again, nothing. Somehow the impact of the hammer was absorbed, even though the hammer rebounded like I'd hit a slab of tempered steel.
"We set up the gravimeter various places around the Aegis to measure gravity, but we're just getting started on that; we really need the overhead photos to mark out a grid. Same with the magnetometer.
"As for radiation, the Geiger counter detected none, and it's not radiating on any electromagnetic frequency that we could measure. Our voltmeter probes showed no indication of voltage, and the electrical resistance of the surface is infinite. Dave's portable oscilloscope didn't give us anything, either.
"And finally, temperature of the surface appears to be nineteen degrees Celsius--sixty-six degrees Fahrenheit--and that holds steady regardless of where we placed the temperature probe. We're going to spend the rest of the day setting up some of our remote sensors and testing them out. That's all we have so far."
"Thanks, Benny and Dave," said Richard. "Laura, what do you have?"
"Sharon and I have been doing a visual reconnaissance. First we did a walkaround through the meadow and surrounding woods and we have a photographic record of that, both video and thirty-five millimeter still shots. No visible signs of human or unusual animal activity anywhere around except right at the crash site; no other tire tracks or footprints, but the ground is as hard as a rock. As we walked around the meadow, we flushed out some grasshoppers and other insects, so animal life appears to be normal. We wondered what was going on with life inside the Aegis but so far we have not seen any insects or birds flying around. We'll set up a couple of remote motion detectors this afternoon to monitor that.
"Sharon used our phony OG&E cherry picker to get up twenty feet or so, and videotaped the whole area inside the Aegis at various focal lengths. There is no evidence of equipment. We thought we'd found something but it turned out to be an old tire. Anyway, if the Aegis is being generated by, or projected from some sort of equipment inside the Aegis, it's either below ground or it's also invisible. Tonight I'll photograph the area in infrared to look for heat differentials in the meadow. If there is some equipment around that's hotter or colder than its surroundings, we'll find it."
"Great job, you two," said Richard. "Work with Dave and Benny to get those remote sensors set up, especially the motion detectors. You'll have to share them because they will be setting some up along the perimeter of the meadow for the security system. Charles--our resident doctor--anything to report?"
"No EBEs [Extraterrestrial Biological Entities] to report so far," he responded. "As Laura said, biological life outside the Aegis appears to be normal. I collected several insect specimens for analysis, which I'll do this evening. I also found something else that might be important: I took a closer look at the grass and weeds growing around the perimeter. The ones growing just on the inside of the Aegis look like they've been cut off right at the Aegis surface with a pair of shears. I looked around right outside the Aegis and found the ends of several severed leaves and stalks which appear to match those on the inside. I doubt that our EBEs mowed the lawn before they built the Aegis, so that means that the Aegis itself sheared those plants."
"What you found is extremely important," said Richard. "If the Aegis sheared the plants, that means it was created right where it stands--everything was normal in the meadow one instant, and then the next instant, 'poof' the Aegis appeared. What was inside the Aegis remained inside, and ditto for everything outside."
"That would be consistent with a something composed of pure energy instead of some form of matter," said Dave.
"Yes, but what kind of energy?" asked Benny. "Nothing we have could create such a surface, and so far we haven't detected any radiation; you'd think that with that much energy, there would be some kind of leakage."
"There might be leakage and we simply can't detect it," said Ralph. "If the Aegis is made of pure energy--and I'm pretty skeptical about that--then we're dealing with a force that we know nothing about and therefore haven't constructed the instrumentation necessary to measure it."
"No known force could have created the Aegis?" asked Richard.
"That's right," replied Ralph. "Let me explain." He settled back in his chair.
"Here comes the lecture," Sharon groaned.
"As I was saying," Ralph continued, "and without getting into too much detail for Sharon's benefit, current theories--namely general relativity and quantum mechanics--describe four forces. The first is electromagnetic, which we're all familiar with. The second is gravity, which we're also familiar with. The third is called the 'weak nuclear' force and is responsible for radioactivity, and the fourth is called the 'strong nuclear' force, which is what holds the protons and neutrons together in an atom. That's all the forces there are, but I should say that the theories about these forces are just that: theories, and actually most physicists hope to show that the four forces I've described are but different aspects of one single, unified force."
"Well, ladies and gentlemen," said Richard, "we may have just discovered the fifth aspect. Let's finish our lunch and get back with it. Oh...and may the Force be with you."

TUESDAY, JUNE 15 - 3:13 PM

The Skyguard group continued its observations and measurements until Charles returned from town. He had obtained a roll of eight-inch orange plastic sheeting from a manufacturer of shopping bags. Laura and Sharon were waiting for him.
"Charles! Guess what we found!" Laura said excitedly.
"I hope it's Martians," replied Charles.
"Almost as good," said Sharon. "It's in the house--Laura thought we should put it in the fridge."
The three entered the kitchen and Laura pulled a small paper sack out of the refrigerator. "Go ahead--open it!"
"Hmmm," said Charles. "Too small for a six-pack." Opening the sack, he reached in and pulled out the front half of a squirrel. "Where did you find this?"
"On the far side of the Aegis, closest to the woods."
"Looks like it was hit with a meat cleaver. A very sharp meat cleaver."
"I bet you can't guess where we found the back half!"
"Inside the Aegis?"
"Yep, just like the grass and weeds you found," said Laura.
"What did the area around the crime scene' look like?"
"The front half of the squirrel was about three inches out from the surface, and the rear half was sideways, about maybe one inch from the surface--on the inside of the Aegis, of course. We took some still shots but we haven't developed any film yet."
"Hmm. Body sections were not flush with the surface--possibly due to postmortem muscle contractions. Any blood spatter?"
"No. Some blood on the ground where the squirrel bled out, but no spatter at all."
Charles looked closely at the severed surfaces. "Looks like a nice, clean cut. Considering the circumstances, I hate to speculate. I'll do a full workup on this little varmint and see if there's more he can tell us."

The rest of the afternoon progressed without further discoveries. Charles took the squirrel back to the Skyguard hangar for vivisection and to perform some lab tests, and he delivered the undeveloped rolls of 35 millimeter film to the darkroom. Dave and Benny continued their materials testing and set up the remote sensors while Sharon videotaped their endeavors. Laura knew that as soon as it was dark she would begin three hours of infrared photography, so she retired to the house to consolodate the group's journal entries for the record. Richard made arrangements for a helicopter to do a photographic flyover the next morning and he also checked on the status of the staged vehicle accident. The "discovery" of Mrs. Colston's SUV had gone without a hitch and the husband had been notified. Because the sheriff himself was conducting the accident investigation, Richard knew there would be no questions.
At 6:30 p.m., the group packed its equipment and moved it into the house for the night. Benny plugged the sensors into the recording devices and alarms and made sure each was working properly. Four digital video cameras with motion detectors covered the perimeter of the meadow and two more were aimed toward the center of the Aegis. Temperature and vibration sensors were attached to poles which were propped up against the Aegis surface, all attempts to fasten them down with adhesives having failed. Finally, two seismographs were anchored near the Aegis to measure ground vibration.
"That's a good start," said Benny as he started the chart recorder. "If we think of anything else I can install it tomorrow. This new recorder is a beauty--I've still got seven channels left for more sensors."
As Benny was finishing up, the OG&E truck drivers pulled up to the house to get their security assignments for the night. Richard gave them their instructions, then ordered the group to knock off. "If we get any alarms, I will call you. Laura, go get some dinner; I know you've got a long night ahead of you."
"I just want to say thanks for including me in this," said Dave. "I hope I can continue to be of assistance, but if I start getting in the way I want somebody to tell me. And if there's anything I can do, please just holler--I'll give each of you my phone number."
"You've been a big help so far," said Richard. The others voiced their agreement. "We're glad to have your insight--you're a part of the team."
"Thanks," said Dave. "I really appreciate it."
As the group filed out of the house, Laura followed Dave to his Hummer. "If you're not doing anything tonight," she said, "I could really use some help."
"Huh? Sure!" he replied. "I don't know much about photography, but I'm a quick study."
"I'll bet you are," said Laura, "but in this case you don't need to know anything--I'll do all the picture snapping. I plan on being here about nine o'clock--you want me to swing by and pick you up?"
"Oh, that's not necessary--it's probably out of your way."
"No, it's not--not if you live in the Price Tower."
"How did you know where I live?"
"Richard told me. You're the only one he's ever known to snag an apartment in the Price Tower."
"Well, I had some connections, but I was still on the waiting list for over a year. Anyway, if you're offering me a ride, then I accept. It's Apartment 9-B."
"Apartment 9-B," she repeated. "I'll see you about eight-thirty, then."

END OF CHAPTER THREE