IT WAS A COOL AND CRISP SUNDAY MORNING IN THE U.S. NATION’S CAPITAL OF WASHINGTON D.C.

  With the morning hours nearing their end, the forty-fourth United States President, Charles Raymond West, was sitting behind the Resolute Desk in the Oval Office, sipping on a black, unsweetened cup of coffee whilst going over a few official documents that he had to give his seal of approval on.

  As the forty-four-year-old dark-skinned, brown-eyed, and bald headed President West went over the documents a ‘buzzing’ noise rang out from the voice box that sat on top of his desk off to his right.

  “Mister President,” a male’s voice crackled out of the voice box as President West pressed a red button on a nearby microphone.

  “Yes, Jake?” President West asked through the microphone.

  Calling from the other end of the voice box was the President’s Personal Assistant (also known as ‘Bodyman’) Jacob Alan Peterson.

  Mr. Peterson was thirty-six-years-old and had an average body frame, thinning black hair, and fair-skin.

  “You have a visitor here that you would like to meet with you, Sir.”

  “A visitor? Hmm… I don’t remember having any ‘personal meetings’ scheduled for today, Jake.”

  “That’s because you don’t, Mister President.”

  Curious, President West looked over at the voice box to ask, “And who is this visitor?”

  “Retired United States Army General Norman Ulysses Falco, Sir.”

  President West’s eyes immediately widened as he instantly fell back in his seat.

  There was a blank expression on the President’s face as Mr. Peterson asked, “Mister President? SIR… Are you still there?”

  Gulping, President West looked back down at the voice box.

  Pressing the call button on the voice box microphone with a twitchy index finger, President West fumbled, “Yuh-Yes, Jake. I’m here.”

  “Sir, what would you like me to do with this ‘General Falco’?”

  Knowing that the infamous Four-Star General’s surprise visit meant something dire, President West ordered, “Send him to my office, Jake... IMMEDIATELY.”

  _

  Sitting in a waiting room down the hall from the Oval Office surrounded by several Secret Service Members and Security Personnel was former (now retired) United States Army General Norman Ulysses Falco.

  Being sixty-seven-years-old (or ‘years young’ as he liked to say) the rough and tumble former General of the Armies of the United States turned ‘Government Advisor’ sat on a padded metal seat as the Secret Service Agents stood watch over him.

  Falco sported an all Olive Green United States Army General’s uniform with numerous pins and achievement medals that decorated both breast pockets of his jacket.

  The most notable physical features about the old, but ‘diamond-hard’ ex-Army General was that he had slicked back silver hair, a pencil thin mustache, piercing steel-blue-eyes, and three long, faded scars that ripped downward over his right eye stopping at the midway point of his right cheek.

  With his General's hat resting on a silver briefcase that he had placed on his lap, Falco kept a straight-faced look about himself as ‘patiently waited’ for Mr. Peterson to return to him.

  “Alright. Sincerest apologies for making you wait, General,” Mr. Peterson said to Falco, who turned his glare towards him now after walking back to meet with him. “You have been ‘cleared’ to see the President now.”

  “‘BOUT FUCKIN’ TIME,” Falco said in a voice that sounded corroded with motor oil, whiskey, cigarette smoke, and hellfire.

  Mr. Peterson’s eyes widened in surprise at the former General’s ‘foul language’ as he rose up from his seat with the silver briefcase in his hand.

  “Sorry, Sir, but you will have to leave that here,” Mr. Peterson stated in reference to Falco’s Briefcase.

  “SON… I know where you’re going with this,” Falco stated whilst staring at the P.A. directly in his eyes. “Word of advice… DON’T GO THERE.”

  “GENERAL, it is strictly protocol that all outside ‘foreign objects and items’ MUST be left here under SECURITY SUPERVISION whilst one goes to meet with the President. Apologies… BUT THOSE ARE THE RULES.”

  “Don’t lecture me about FUCKING RULES, kid. I’ve been following them were suckin’ on your Mommy’s Titty back in good ole’ fuckin’ Kansas… OR WHERE EVER THE SHIT YOU’RE FROM.”

  A few of the Secret Service Agents snickered as Mr. Peterson stared at Falco in shock.

  “Now, are you going to let me through, Mister Rules… OR ARE WE GONNA HAVE A FUCKIN’ PROBLEM???” General Falco asked Peterson, who still stood frozen before his hard and intense gaze.

  “No problem here,” Mr. Peterson said in a disgusted tone as he now glared sourly at Falco. “You are permitted to move along to the Oval Office, General… WITH YOUR BRIEFCASE.”

  “Good boy,” Falco smirked as he crudely brushed past Peterson with his briefcase still held firmly in his left hand.

  _

  “HELLO, CHUCK,” General Falco greeted after entering the Oval Office all by himself.

  “Norman… By God, man. It’s been sometime, hasn’t it?” President West asked as he rose up from the Resolute Desk to walk over and greet the retired Army General.

  “It has. Good to see you, Mister President,” Falco replied with a smirk, causing West to scrunch his brow at him.

  “Mister President??? COME ON NOW, NORMAN. You know we leave the ‘official titles’ at the door whenever it’s just us talking.”

  “Right… I just like bustin’ your balls a bit, Chucky.”

  “Fuck you. Heh, heh…”

  As the two longtime ‘business partners’ and friends chuckled, President West said, “Please, Norman. Take a seat.”

  “Will do,” Falco nodded as he pulled up a chair in front of the Resolute Desk.

  Sitting back down in his desk chair, President West asked, “So, to what do I owe the ‘gracious pleasure’, Norman? Is everything fine on the ‘extraplanetary’ front?”

  “We’ve got a problem, Chuck,” the Colonel informed whilst motioning down towards the silver briefcase with his eyes.

  “You know, I was afraid you were going to say that. What kind of a problem, Norm?”

  “I think you know. My men back at Division H.Q. have detected two rogue ‘anomalies’ that have made landfall with the Earth in the past FORTY-EIGHT HOURS.”

  “Anomalies???”

  “FUCKING ALIENS, CHUCK.”

  President West’s eyes then widened as the former General proceeded to disengage the silver briefcase’s ‘Biometric Locking System’ with his thumb prints.

  Raising the briefcase’s lid, Falco proceeded to place it up on the President’s Desk and turned it around so its opening faced him.

  Peering down inside of the briefcase, President West saw what was so securely kept within it: A beige folder that the word ‘CONFIDENTIAL’ stamped across its face in red ink.

  Placed alongside the folder was a currently ‘asleep’ UPad, to which the President drifted his eyes over towards as Falco sternly ordered, “READ THROUGH THE FILE, CHUCK. It’ll tell you everything that you NEED to know about the increasingly growing situation.”

  Reaching for the file with his right hand, President West carefully pulled it out of the case.

  Flipping the folder open, the President immediately started going through the several ‘Confidential United States Government Official Documents’ that lay inside it.

  “As I said before, Chuck,” Falco continued as President West went through the documents. “In the past forty-eight hours, my men at H.Q. have been tracking two separate rogue anomalies that made landfall with Earth in…”

  “IOWA???” President West uttered whilst still going through the documents.

  “Yes, Chuck. They landed in Iowa. They made landfall at least a day apart from one another in a small, little fuckin’ NOTHING of a town in the most Southeastern Sector of the state called ‘Keokuk’.”

  “It says here in these documents, Norm, that this ‘Keokuk’ is home to approximately ten thousand, seven hundred and forty-eight United States Citizens.”

  The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.

  Glancing up to meet eyes with Falco, President West stated, “Sure doesn’t seem like a ‘little fucking nothing of a town’ as you so elegantly put it.”

  “Everything that’s stated in those documents, Chuck, says that it’s a rural, PODUNK community. Sounds like a ‘fucking nothing’... DOESN’T IT?”

  “So, you think that these two ‘anomalies’ are, in fact, extraterrestrial-based in origin?”

  “I KNOW THEY ARE, CHUCK.”

  “Oh really? And where’s your proof then? PHYSICAL PROOF, NORMAN. All I see here are ‘topographical maps’ of the ‘Landing Zone Area’ and other basic information regarding this Keokuk.”

  “The UPad, Chuck… HAND IT TO ME.

  Once the UPad was in his grasp after President West had handed it over to him, the ex-General took it out of sleep mode, unlocked its screen, and immediately filed through its database system.

  As President West sat back in his seat, Falco explained whilst sifting through the UPad by swiping his finger on its touchscreen, “With the ‘Extraterrestrial Tracking System Array’ that we have installed in the GPS Block II-F Satellite we recorded videographic evidence… PHYSICAL PROOF of the two said ‘Extraterrestrial Anomalies’ during their separate entries into the Earth’s Atmosphere.”

  Pulling up the two videos of the anomalies (The Guardinian Escape Shuttle Pod and the Vexan Mawl Scout’s Pod), Falco handed the UPad back over to the President.

  “MOTHER OF GOD,” President West gasped as he watched the videos (which Falco had slowed in speed) of the two U.F.Os.

  “Like what ya see, Chuckie?” Falco asked as the President continued to watch the ‘E.T.S.A.’s’ video recorded footage in total shock.

  “We have a problem,” President West uttered nervously as he stared at the ex-General’s scarred face.

  “A BIG FUCKIN’ PROBLEM,” Falco crudely corrected. “But not to fret, Chuck… MY DEAR OLD PAL. As you ALREADY KNOW, the Division… MY DIVISION specializes in researching, tracking, containing… AND ERADICATING all Extraterrestrial Threats to the human race.”

  “What is it EXACTLY that you want from me, General?”

  “Oh, it’s quite simple… Mister President. I want you to give me permission to send a ‘RESPONSE TEAM’ out to Keokuk to find and KILL whatever METEOR-FUCKING-FREAKS came down to OUR PLANET in those two U.F.Os.”

  “I can’t believe this… I CAN’T BELIEVE that you want me to give you the permission and CLEARANCE to send your band of WAR-LOVING MONGRELS to a small ‘farm town’ in FULL LETHAL FORCE.”

  “YOU SAW THE DAMN FOOTAGE, CHUCK!!!”

  “NORMAN, PLEASE! Sit back down and restrain your--”

  “You know what’ll happen if we ignore this and do NOTHING! It’ll be anarchy! It’ll be another ‘McMurray Incident’!!!”

  “GENERAL, PLEASE STOP!”

  “BUT INSTEAD OF A ‘COUPLE’ HUMAN CASUALTIES IT’LL BE HUNDREDS! THOUSANDS!!!”

  “MISTER PRESIDENT,” Peterson cried out after rushing inside of the Oval Office with two Secret Service Agents accompanying him closely from behind. “Mister President… ARE YOU OKAY??? We heard screaming...”

  “EVERYTHING’S FINE, JUNIOR,” Falco coarsely replied, causing Mr. Peterson to turn a fierce glare on the back of his silver-haired head.

  “I WASN’T TALKING TO YOU,” Mr. Peterson gritted, causing the ex-General to briefly snicker.

  “IT’S FINE, JAKE,” President West shockingly revealed, causing Peterson and the Secret Service Agents to stare at him with widened eyes. “Everything's fine. The General and I were just having a little… ‘disagreement’.”

  “Heh… Fuckin’ A,” Falco scoffed as Mr. Peterson glared at him again before looking back at the President.

  “Are you sure, Mister President?” Peterson asked with his brow lowered.

  “‘Course he’s sure, Son,” Falco interjected as he went to turn around and face the concerned P.A. “He is ‘El Presidente’ after all, ain’t he?”

  “Thank you for your concern, Jake… BUT EVERYTHING’S FINE,” President West sternly stated. “Now please, leave us so General Falco and I can get back to our conversation… PRIVATELY.”

  Narrowing his eyes at the President, Mr. Peterson replied, “Yes, Sir,” and departed from the Oval Office with the Secret Service Agents… But not before glaring at Falco who, in turn, flipped him the middle finger.

  “Quite the fuckin’ PLEEB you got there ‘doin’ your ‘laundry’, Chuck,” Falco remarked in reference to Mr. Peterson. “AN UPTIGHT BASTARD, he is… But he cares about his work. Send’em on down to the Division and we’ll make’em one HELLUVA operative.”

  “It’ll NEVER happen, Norman,” President West firmly seared. “I won’t allow a ‘good man’ like Jake be turned into a ‘soulless animal’ like your men at the Division.”

  “Soulless animal??? CHUCKIE, I’M INSULTED.”

  “I don’t care, Norman. ALL I CARE ABOUT right now, AT THIS VERY MOMENT, is the current situation in Keokuk, Iowa.”

  “Welp, Chuck. You’ll have a whole HELLUVALOT more to worry about once this goes public.”

  “YOU WOULDN’T…”

  “Me? OF COURSE NOT! The hell kinda person do you think I am, Chuckie?”

  “The kind of person who would do such a WORLD-STOPPING thing to get what he wants.”

  The ex-General smirked.

  Sitting back down in his seat, Falco said in a more calm and direct tone of voice, “Listen, Chuck… AND YOU BETTER LISTEN FUCKIN’ GOOD ‘cause I’m only gonna say this once: You give me the ‘ok and go ahead’ and I’ll send a team down to Keokuk, Iowa and have this incident washed away in no less than SEVENTY-TWO HOURS.”

  “Seriously? You could take care of this situation in just THREE DAYS???”

  “OR LESS… So long as you give me the permissions and clearances I need. ALL OF THEM.”

  Thinking over his options, President West lowered his wrinkled brow Falco kept his cold, steel blue eyes locked on him like a Red-Tailed Hawk.

  “Urgh… Fine. Permissions and clearances… GRANTED.”

  “Thank you… Mister President,” Falco smirked as he reached out to shake hands with the ‘Commander in Chief’... But he did not oblige.

  Snickering, the ex-General arose from his seat, gathered up the Folder and UPad, and placed them both back in the silver briefcase.

  “I’ll keep you updated on our progress once I have a team dispatched to Keokuk,” Falco informed as President West coldly glared at him. “They’ll be there by ‘O-Five Hundred’... Central Standard Time.”

  “Just don’t let this get out of control, Norman,” President West sternly ordered. “No ‘CLEAN SLATES’ like in McMurray ten years ago.”

  Smirking again before departing from the Oval Office, Falco replied, “Understood, Mister President.”

  Turning away from President West, Falco said as he headed towards the double wooden doors that led out of the Oval Office, “Just so long as everyone plays ball… AND STAY THE HELL OUTTA MY WAY.”

  _

  “Swardson… YOU’VE BEEN ACTIVATED,” Falco said to his TOP Field Agent Operative at the E.T.R.D. (Extraterrestrial Response Division) via a cellphone call.

  Sitting in the Terminal at the Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport in D.C., Specialized Level 3-Class Agent Kennedy Lionel Swardson smirked as he replied, “Roger that, Sir.”

  Swardson then ended the secret, untracked call with the ex-General/E.T.R.D. Head Director and stuck his UPhone back in the right side pocket of the black trench coat that he was wearing.

  As Agent Swardson waited for his flight out to Keokuk, Iowa to meet up with a ‘Response Team’, whose mission was to investigate (and possibly terminate) the Extraterrestrial Anomalies that had secretly been plaguing the small urban town in the past forty-eight hours, he caught the eye of very beautiful woman who sat in a seat to his left.

  Looking over Swardson’s business attire, the raven-haired and tantalizing green-eyed beauty smiled at him.

  “Um… Excuse me?” the raven-haired beauty asked Swardson, who finally looked over at her.

  “Yes?”

  “Sorry. I don’t mean to be rude… But what’s with the ‘get up’? Are you going to a ‘funeral’ or

  something?”

  “No. Just work business.”

  “Work, huh? Well, what do you do, if you don’t mind me asking? WAIT! LET ME GUESS! You’re a Stock Broker, aren’t you? OR are you some kind of ‘big shot’ Attorney? You look the type. Heh, heh, heh…”

  “No. Not at all.”

  “Damn! Well, what is it that you do then???”

  “I work for a covert-ops, ‘off the books’ United States Government-funded organization whose SOLE PURPOSE is to track down, detain, research… AND ERADICATE, if necessary, ALL Unregistered Extraterrestrial Life-Forms who enter and land upon our planet… UNPERMITTED.”

  The raven-haired beauty now stared at Swardson strangely with her eyes widened as he continued, “In short… I HUNT AND KILL ALIENS.”

  As the raven-haired beauty continued to stare at the Top Secret, Specialized Government Field Agent, Swardson asked with his brow scrunched, “Tell me, Miss… What’s your name?”

  “Cuh-Coutier. Elisha Courtier…”

  “Elisha Courtier. Sounds pretty. As for me, you can call me ‘John’... SMITH.”

  As Elisha looked down at Swardson’s right hand, who held it out towards her for a handshake, the E.T.R.D. Field Operative smirked, “Apologies… But we can’t use our ‘real names’ in my particular line of work. Also… YOU’LL NEVER SEE MY FACE AGAIN.”

  “Uh… Sorry. I… I have to catch my flight,” Elisha awkwardly fumbled as she quickly gathered up her things and bolted away from Swardson, leaving his hand unshaken.

  “Nice meeting you, Miss Courtier!” Swardson called out as Elisha continued to flee from him. “AND IF Y’SEE ANY ‘LITTLE GREEN MEN’ BE SURE TO SEND THEM MY WAY!!! HA-HA-HA!!!”

  Once Elisha had vanished from his view, Special Agent Swardson leaned back in his chair whilst snickered, “Heh, heh… Fuckin’ civies. Heh, heh, heh…”