December, 1999
U.S. Military Installation
Nevada Desert, U.S.A.
“Jacob, let’s just honest with one another. You’ve been here for more than fifty years. They’re not coming for you. They’ve forgot about you. And knowing what we know about your genetics, you have a lot of life left. Do you really want to spend the rest of it going against the grain? Wouldn’t you like some sort of friendship or companionship?
Frank was Jacob’s seventh “Handler.” Since the early 1990’s Frank had built - what he thought was at least an understanding - with the being across the table from him.
Jacob wore a hooded cloak; only his hands and the lower half of his “pointy” jaw were visible. His skin was a light grey, dry and ashy looking.
“I thought you were my friend Frank.” Jacob replied as he slowly lifted his head; his abnormally large black eyes locking with Frank’s eyes.
“I am your friend Jacob, and I will always be your friend. There are things that I can change, and there are things that I cannot. What I can change is how much longer this goes on. Every week I’m here having the same conversation with you. You’ve been through hell since you arrived. We poked, prodded, and probed you; we’ve tortured you. But we’re past all that now and we have been for years. What is it going to take at this point?”
“I maintain my position, I will not tell you where the gate is. I’ve seen how your kind handles ‘differences,’ and I won’t allow my species to be subject to your species.”
Jacob spoke perfect English; he was always clear, concise, and if you had never met him and only spoke to him over the phone, you’d have no reason to believe he wasn’t human.
Jacob is a “grey.” While his biology and appearance makes him different from humans, not much else does. Over the years, he’s shared quite a bit about himself, his species, where he’s from, and why he came here.
Jacob’s “people” are an advanced race of aliens that, over the course of millennia, have developed interstellar travel by way of star gates. These star gates allow for space to be condensed, halved, and shortened, ultimately allowing for seemingly instant transport throughout the cosmos.
The technology is not far from the theories proposed by some of humanity's greatest minds. But there’s a catch. These star gates are launched - like our own satellites - into space, but have no defined destination. They travel like comets and meteors and where and when they end up is never known. Some go right into suns; some land on moons; some land on larger naturally occurring comets and meteors.
The star gates are “opened” by the aliens when these aliens receive a signal that the gate has “landed.” Once opened, probes are sent into the gate to determine if life exists or could exist. If the probe receives a positive confirmation of life or the building blocks of life, a single reconnaissance craft - piloted by one alien - is sent to observe and report.
According to Jacob, these reconnaissance missions are peaceful; his species has long left the domain of violence and conflict. Knowledge and understanding is their goal, regardless of the other “life” they sometimes encounter on the other side of the gate.
While conducting his reconnaissance mission, Jacob’s craft traversed the star gate - one of seven on Planet Earth - and then experienced a “malfunction of the quagulation thruster” and crashed.
This became what is known in American folklore as the “Rosewell Incident.”
And while the conspiracies detail of multiple craft, multiple “alien bodies,” and some grand scheme to reverse engineer the technology, the American government was simply interested in why Jacob had come here. And when the government found out about the star gates, that’s all they really wanted.
They didn’t care for Jacob, his culture, or even his beliefs - even though Jacob was actually his given name. Nope, not given to him by us humans, but by his own species. Turns out some things transcend even the galaxy. And that’s also why Jacob so easily “picked-up” our English language; based on our own evolution and some of the stories told by Jacob, it seems like any intelligent beings tend to develop very similar belief systems, cultural norms, and even lexicons. It really brings the whole “god” argument back into the mix. And funny enough, a star gate is a star gate, is a star gate - and we thought Ronald Emmerich made the term popular. Silly self-centered humans.
When Jacob’s craft crashed, a signal was sent back to all of the star gates. As a false-safe, the aliens designed the star gates to shut down all but one gate in any given solar system should the reconnaissance craft experience any malfunction. This would reduce the risk of anyone or anything on the other side of the gate from finding the alien’s homeland. And while it assumes a “hostile action” has occurred, thus the closure of the gates, one remains open in the hopes that the pilot of the craft is alive, and can safely navigate - either repair the craft, or travel on foot - to the remaining gate and return home. There was an unwritten rule that the aliens would not retrieve any pilots; the risk of an intergalactic war was far too great.
America wanted the gate however; they wanted the technology. And Jacob was going to give it to them no matter what.
“I guess I’ll see you next week Jacob.” Frank got up and walked toward the door in the tiny room.
“Hey Frank. Babylon.”
Frank spun around immediately and walked back to the table.
“What?” Frank said with a look of surprise on his face.
“Babylon” Jacob repeated.
“Like the ancient city of Babylon? Like the place in Iraq?”
Jacob simply nodded, acknowledging Frank’s answer.
“I don’t understand Jacob. You’ve sat here for five decades. Why now? Why now to reveal the location of the opened gate?” Frank continued.
“Because I have surmised what you humans intend to do with my blood; my biology. And I can only draw the logical conclusion that it will end in global suffering.” Jacob replied.
While the American government only wanted the star gate, the corporations and firms that were made privy to Jacob’s existence wanted other stuff, and they paid the right people handsomely for it. Jacob’s physiology; the physiology of his species was very curious. Jacob hadn’t aged much since 1947; he explained that his species lives on average over 1000 years on his home planet. That’s how they’ve advanced so far in technology; hypotheses, theories, and experiments don’t “restart” like they do for humans every time a human dies. The aliens work a problem for hundreds of years; they solve the problem.
Jacob also healed quickly. This was demonstrated by the physical torture he endured at humanity’s hands early in his capture. Cuts, gashes, broken bones, and wounds of all types healed within minutes and hours. Jacob was also resilient to viruses and bacteria.
You can only imagine the money that was paid by scientists and “Big Pharma” for even just a drop of Jacob’s blood.
Frank was perplexed by Jacob's explanation for revealing the location of the star gate.
“What do you mean ‘suffering’?” Frank asked Jacob.
“You allow me to watch your media and read your news publications. I know your history. For every one of you that sets down a reasonable path of scientific exploration, there are ten more of you torturing beagles in the name of fashion or looking for the next ‘gain of function’ milestone in some naturally occurring virus. I can only imagine what some of you are doing with my blood in some secret lab somewhere.” Jacob responded, delivering a frightening reality that Frank hadn’t thought much of.
“And you need me to help you reverse engineer the gate. I’ve finally come to the conclusion that working with you is in my best interest. And in my best interest before you destroy yourselves. I will bring you to the gate. I will allow you to study it. I will help you build your own. Then you will allow me to pass through the gate and return home.”
Frank stared at Jacob for a moment.
“Deal.” Frank said, then turned and walked out.
Frank left the room knowing full well that he couldn’t make the deal.
And Jacob sat there also knowing full well that Frank couldn’t promise anything.
Frank walked down a long corridor and into his office. He picked up the phone.
“I need to speak to Secretary Cohen now. And also, get me a plane. I need to get to DC.”
Frank hung up the phone. He leaned back in his chair and thought quietly to himself.
“Saddam spits on our weapons inspectors. He’s not just gonna let our guys go into his country to look for some piece of alien tech. Especially not into a place like Babylon.”
The phone rang. Frank picked it up and said “Mr. Secretary, we have a location. Now we need a reason. We need to turn up the volume on this ‘weapons of mass destruction’ thing we got going on with our buddy Saddam.”
“Well holy-shit. Babylon huh? This is gonna be fun.” Secretary Cohen replied.