by Max Barry

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Region: The North Pacific

Tanabon wrote:Incident log: USS Essex Fighter incident.

February 22nd, 1964

That was the heading typed on Special Agent Warrens Typewriter. Him and another Special Agent sat across from a man in a tattered Olive Drab flight suit. The unit patch had been stained and discolored, his brown hair was ragged and messy, dirt smeared on his face. His name patch read, (though it was also dirty and discolored by stains), "HARRIS."

The agents both wore Black suits, both of them matching. They where pressed, the tie neatly placed. Though you couldn't see below the table, the pants they where wearing had perfectly ironed creases, shoes immaculately shined. An earpiece sat in both of their ears, the use unknown to the casual watcher. The small room was filled with wisps of cigarette smoke, coming from the other Agents cigarette. He took a puff from it before hitting record on the big tape recorder sitting on the desk amidst paperwork.

Agent Warren began.

"Please state your name, rate, and rank for the record please."

He looked at the paper in the typewriter, making sure no mistakes where made.

"Uh, LT. James Harris, USS Essex Combat pilot." He said, leaning forward.

"Date of birth?" Warren asked

Harris replied "June 3rd, 1934... I... I was born then."

"Alright, Mr. Harris. Now, we have a few questions for you about the events on January 25th. If you could, please begin at the beginning."

Harris looked around the room for a second, and hesitated before starting.

"Well... it began like this, you see? I was done with a combat patrol over Pollonia, and was returning to base. I was talking to the carrier when the a strange change in the weather happened. It was almost like... a thick fog appeared. I was talking to the carrier, about wind speed and so forth, fuel gauge levels, that sort of thing..."

Harris attempted to peer through the fog, unable to see much more that his instruments.

"USS Essex, I've got a problem. Visibility is almost zero, heavy turbulence. Do you copy?" He said, only getting static back in response. He tried to regain contact.
"Essex, do you copy? Essex? Essex?!"

Terror began to fill his heart as he heard the dreaded sound of engine faling, the whirring down in pitch. He looked at his gauges, all of them flipping out, his navy ball spinning and spinning and spinning around, the altimeter climbing infinitely, airspeed level dropping through the negatives.

Then, out of nowhere the fog cleared. He was in a flat spin, coming down over a purplish landscape. He didn't have time to think about it as he attempted to regain control. His flaps attempted to bite into the air, mostly unable to. Harris ripped off his oxygen mask, and panted hard with terror. His mind only thought one thing, and that was to eject from his aircraft. Still spinning, he grabbed the ejection lever and ripped it up. In an instant the G forces of multiple rocket engines igniting threw him up towards the sky, away from the doomed aircraft.

After stabilizing his seat and pulling the chute cord, he looked down at the A-4 Skyhawk as it plummeted down into the purple forest, before being enveloped below the trees and destroyed in a subsequent fireball. As soon as he was on the ground, he attempted to stand from his seat. When he attempted, he felt his knees buckle as he fell to a tree to stabilize himself. Eventually he gave in and laid in the dirt, staring up at the sky that he had fell from. He knew he was lost, and his chances of rescue slim. He didn't care, all he wanted right now was to lay.

Project: Purple Book interview. USS Essex Aircraft Incident Report.
February 5th, 1964

"So, I just kinda... lay on the ground. It was weird, like a powder. I don't know how to describe it too well, other than it was otherworldly. Anyway, I then started to get a hold of myself, and training kicked in. I used my survival knife to cut the strings of my parachute, and packed it into a neat wrap. I didn't fall too far from the aircraft, so I began the walk..."

Harris was tired, the incident had fatigued him heavily. In any case, if he wanted to survive, he needed to get to his aircraft and get the survival equipment... If the equipment had survived of course. During the trek, he looked around. The world was... unsettling. There was a strange purple tint in the sky, same with the tree and the bushes and the grass and the rocks and the ferns. He knelt down next to one of the strange plants, and touched it through his flight gloves. He looked in awe at the different parts, the striking similarity to ferns back on Strangereal. He was leaving the panic phase, and entering into one of more... composure. He stood up from the plant, gave it another observation, before continuing on his way to the wreckage.

When he eventually reached his aircrafts wreckage, he ran his hands through his hair and took it all in, though he was not surprised to find that it was not more than twisted metal. Downed trees scattered about with burning grass, the fire of which had a purple tint. Around the radius of the flattened field was scorched trees, also burning with a purple tint. The cockpit was thrown a few meters from the crash sight, flattened slightly from the impact. He walked up to the side of his aircraft, and held his hand to it. The black soot came off and stuck to his flight glove, leaving his print where he had laid it on the warm aluminum body-

"Stop right there. This is a lot of information, Can you please draw a picture of the trees, fern, and the crash sight for the record? I'm particularly interested in the fern."

Special Agent Warren said, taking out a pencil and a sheet of notebook paper. He sat the items across the table, in front of LT. Harris. He then began sketching to the best of his ability the trees he had encountered, the wreckage placement, and what seemed to be some of the fine details of the fern.

Harris then scooted in and handed the paper over to Warren. He examined the paper. He noted the twisted nature of one and the tall, almost pole like nature of the other. He then looked at the fern drawing. It looked to him like a normal fern, with the notable difference of its number of sprouts and the basic location of its extremities. He then handed the paper over to the Other Special Agent, who looked at it through his thick rimmed black glasses, and gave a nod before slipping it into a Manila folder that was stamped PROJECT: PURPLE BOOK. TOP SECRET. In bold, red letters.

"So, what did you do next, to the best of your knowledge?" He said, leaning in.

"Well, next I tried to make a fire..."

Harris has now gathered some sticks from just outside the crash site that weren't charred too badly. He had gotten his hands on the aluminum case that contained the survival kit. It was battered and scorched, but the insulation hopefully had kept the heat from the items inside. he found a flare gun with 5 shots, a mirror, emergency blanket, water purification tablets, a small .22 caliber hunting rifle, 50 rounds for it, 3 clips and 10 extra rounds for his 1911, some C Rations, enough for about 5 days if used correctly. He also found a trapping guide, basic survival guide, a flora and fauna guide for the Pollonian landscape, matches, flint and steel, an axe, and six packets of purified water.

He used some of the pages from the flora and fauna guide as kindling, seeing as he was, he suspected, nowhere near Pollonia. When he had the fire burning and enough wood stockpiled, he took out one of the pocket novels he had and began reading. The book was called War of The Worlds, something that had come out in the 1890s. He thought of the field guns being employed, and how modern weaponry would easily dispatch the walkers. He imagined a missile from an F-4 Phantom slamming into the tripod walkers of the invaders, easily killing the occupier. It gave him something to keep his mind off his predicament, something he did not want to think about at the moment.

Great solordia, East supple lund, and The Islands of Tonga

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