“First let me introduce myself. My name is [Request Anonymous]. I am a retired employee of the U.S. Government. I won’t go into any great details about my past, but I was involved in a special program.”


Thus began the first in a series of lengthy messages received in 2005 by a UFO discussion group moderated by a former U.S. Government employee by the name of Victor Martinez. The source of the messages requested that his identity remain undisclosed for fear of being prosecuted or even worse. And he had good reason, for calling the nature of his disclosures sensitive was an understatement.

According to the anonymous source, in the early 1950’s the government initiated Project Serpo, a top secret program intended to open communication channels between mankind (represented, of course, by the U.S. Government) and a race of extraterrestrials from Serpo, a planet located in the Zeta Reticuli star system.

Zeta Reticuli is a binary star system in the southern constellation of Reticulum. Although both stars are similar in size to our own sun, spectral analysis shows they are much younger, at around 2 billion years of age. Whether this interval is enough for a highly intelligent, spacefaring species to develop is not up to us to decide. Furthermore, the aliens inhabiting Serpo originated elsewhere in the galaxy.

The incident that led to this interplanetary connection was none other than the Roswell crash. Or, should I say–crashes, because there were two of them: one southwest of Corona, New Mexico and the other near Pelona Peak, which is a rock’s throw away from Datil, NM.

The crash involved two extraterrestrial aircraft. The Corona site was found a day later by an archaeology team. This team reported the crash site to the Lincoln county Sheriff’s department. A deputy arrived the next day and summoned a police officer. One live EBE [extraterrestrial biological entity] was found hiding behind a rock. The entity was given water but declined food. The entity was later transferred to Los Alamos,” the anonymous source wrote.

It’s interesting to note that the entity accepted water. This seems to suggest it might have shared a biology similar to our own and also cements the idea that life on Earth might have originated elsewhere in the universe. The EBE’s refusal to ingest food might have had cultural bases rather than physiological ones. Or maybe it wasn’t hungry enough.

Eventually the Roswell Army Air Field was notified of the crash and promptly intervened. After a thorough examination of the Corona site, all evidence was loaded onto flatbed trucks and carried away to an undisclosed location. A total of six extraterrestrial bodies were recovered and transported to the Los Alamos National Laboratory because the facility had a (then) recently-developed cooling system that allowed scientists to preserve the bodies for subsequent research.

aliens_los_alamos

The live alien was kept under strict surveillance at the same facility. Picture this: you’re being held captive by a decidedly inferior species, you’re the sole individual of your kind on an alien planet and the governing powers house you under the same roof as your fallen and frozen brethren. Now that’s adding insult to injury!

Another two years would pass until the second crash site would be discovered. It’s reasonable to expect that no survivors were found but the wreckage containing invaluable technology and desiccated bodies were whisked off to Sandia Army Base in Albuquerque, New Mexico.

In the meantime, the live EBE had already established a means of communication with the scientists and top brass and we can assume they were very eager to know what he had to say. Yes, he, because his species also had male-female gender division.

The alien revealed the name of his homeworld: Eben. Its location was, like the title says, in the Zeta Reticuli star system. He also informed scientists about the various instruments and ultra advanced technology on board the two downed spacecraft. You can envision the power and demonstration hungry military officials pressuring the translators to squeeze more out of their extraterrestrial captive.

Until his death in 1952, the alien version of Robinson Crusoe (one that never gets to make a living on his own, but is rather captured by the savages) continued to provide information regarding the items inside the two spaceships. If we weren’t so understanding, we could probably blame him for all the triangle-shaped UFOs zipping silently above our heads. At least part of those must be man-made and operated, albeit using technology reverse-engineered from these early UFO crashes. Did you honestly believe aliens are responsible for all the sightings?

Before he died, the EBE managed to set up one of the communication devices present aboard one of their vehicles and contact his homeworld. The humans who oversaw this procedure must have been sitting on the outer edge of their seats until the response came back.

But back it came and things eventually turned out way better than they could have hoped for. They Ebens agreed to come visit! The date was set for April 1964 and, showing that punctuality is a must-have trait of advanced civilizations, they touched ground somewhere near Alamogordo, New Mexico. They unceremoniously retrieved the bodies of their kin and engaged in information exchange with the earthlings via a translation device. English was the chosen language, because they were the visitors and courtesy knows no planetary boundaries.

12i44e

For the betterment of mankind, the Ebens agreed to set up an exchange program. Twelve members were carefully selected for the mission: 8 USAF, 2 U.S. Army and 2 U.S. Navy. Two of them were doctors, three were scientists, two were linguists, two of them handled security, two were pilots and the last one was the leader, an Air Force Colonel.

All of them were given alternate identities and they were effectively erased from all military and civilian records. It was as if they never existed in the first place and that made them ideal candidates for a mission from which they might never return. The 12 went through six months of rigorous training and were given the order to maintain contact with Earth via the already-established communication links.

As per their agreement, the aliens returned in 1965 and left one of their own behind shortly before whizzing lifting up the brave dozen. Their mission was supposed to last ten years, during which regular communication had to be maintained. But the best-laid plans of mice, men and aliens often go astray. The team’s transmissions to Earth HQ were sporadic at best and didn’t always include the greatest of news. Three years into their stay, one doctor and one of the security personnel died. Pneumonia and injury sustained from a fall were the culprits.

Five years after they’d left, communication stopped altogether. The U.S. Government was in the dark regarding Project Serpo, of which they had had such high expectations. But then, in 1978, three years after the agreed-upon return date, the Ebens came back and dropped off seven men and one woman. Two were dead and two had decided to remain behind.

They were placed in quarantine for a whole year during which they had plenty of time to debrief their superiors. As a matter of fact, the complete account they brought back is said to have numbered around 3,000 pages.

According to the crew members, the cosmic journey to Eben lasted only 9 months, despite the distance of 39 light-years that separates us from them.

superluminal

FTL travel FTW!

Although it already had a name, the crew nicknamed the planet Serpo, hence the name of the top-secret project. With a diameter of 7,200 miles, it was slightly smaller than Earth. It had two moons, the day was 43 earth hours long and it revolved around its star in 865 earth days. The Eben Solar System numbered six planets. The Ebens had established bases on the one that was nearest to Serpo (nicknamed OTTO) but it was a lifeless world.

Silus, another of the planets in their Solar System had its own native lifeforms but none were intelligent. The Ebens mined it for minerals their homeworld lacked.

On Serpo, the heat was extreme (by human standards) and it took the crew a long time to adjust. Water was readily available but food was a problem. The team only brought enough food with them to last for two years so they eventually had to resort to eating native cuisine. At first, it caused them gastrointestinal problems but they eventually adapted. The human body is one versatile machine.

End of Part I.

Part II HERE