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the old veterinary building where Brown was standing watch. But when | got there, where he was supposed to be, | didn't see him. Something was wrong. "What the hell are you doing in there, Brownie?" | began cussing out the figure that peeked out at me from behind the door. "Have you gone off your rocker?" He was supposed to be outside the building, not hiding in a doorway. It was a breach of duty. "Better be good, "| said as | walked over to where he was standing and waited for him outside the door. "Now you get out here where | can see you, "| ordered. Whatever was going on, | didn't want to play any games. The post duty sheet for that night read that the veterinary building was off-limits to everyone. Not even the sentries were allowed inside because whatever had been loaded in had been classified as "No Access. " What was Brown doing on the inside? He stepped out from inside the door, and even through the shadow | could see that his face was a dead pale, just as if he'd seen a ghost. "You won't believe this, " he said. "| don't believe it and | just saw it." "The guys who off-loaded those deuce-and-a-halfs, " he said. "They told us they brought these boxes up from Fort Bliss from some accident out in New Mexico?" "Well, they told us it was all top secret but they looked inside anyway. Everybody down there did when they were loading the trucks. MPs were walking around with sidearms and even the officers were standing guard, " Brown said. "But the guys who loaded the trucks said they looked inside the boxes and didn't believe what they saw. You got security clearance, Major. You can come in here. " In fact, | was the post duty officer and could go anywhere | wanted during the watch. So | walked inside the old veterinary building, the medical dispensary for the cavalry horses before the First World War, and saw where the cargo from the convoy had been stacked up. There was no one in the building except for Bill Blown and myself. "That's just it, Major, nobody knows, " he said. "The drivers told us it came from a plane crash out in the desert somewhere around the 509th. But when they looked inside, it was nothing like anything they'd seen before. Nothing from this planet. " It was the silliest thing I'd ever heard, enlisted men's tall stories that floated from base to base getting more inflated every lap around the track. Maybe | wasn't the world's smartest guy, but | had enough engineering and intelligence schooling to pick my way around pieces of wreckage and come up with two plus two. We walked over to the tarpaulin shrouded boxes, and | threw back the edge of the canvas. | almost wanted to tell him that that's what he was supposed to be doing all along instead of snooping into classified material, but | did what | used to do best and kept my mouth shut. | waited while he took up his position at the door to the building before | dug any further into the boxes. There were about thirty-odd wooden crates nailed shut and stacked together against the far wall the building. The light switches were the push type and | didn't know which switch tripped which circuit, so | used my flashlight and stumbled around until my eyes got used to the darkness and shadows. | didn't want to start pulling apart the nails, so | set the flashlight off to one side where it could throw light on the stack and then searched for a box that could open easily. Then | found an oblong box off to one side with a wide seam under the top that looked like it had been already opened. It looked like either the strangest weapons crate you'd ever see or the 14 "Major Corso, " a voice hissed out of the darkness. It had an edge of terror and excitement to it. "You don't understand, Major, " he whispered again. "You have to see this. " Brown popped his head out from behind the door. "You know what's in here?" he asked. "Brownie, you know you're not supposed to be in there, "| said. "Get out here and tell me what's going on. " "What are you talking about?" | asked. "Yeah, so what?" | was getting impatient with this. "What is all this stuff?" | asked. "You're not supposed to be in here, "| told Brownie. "You better go. " "I'l watch outside for you, Major. "