"Oh, Lord!" he breathed.
He had always been a doubter. The Air Force had insisted, as it had every right to do on the basis of available evidence, that flying saucers could be given no support at all in official quarters. It had never stated categorically that the numerous reported sightings could be all explained away in easy and facile fashion, but it had maintained a sound, sane and entirely justifiable attitude in regard to them. That attitude was everlastingly to the Air Force's credit. Even now Clegman could find no fault with it. It was just that—here at last was the evidence!
They were coming in over the southern tip of the missile area, still a half mile or more from the base and flying at a very low altitude. Five immense silvery disks, their edges glinting in the dawn light, their summits slightly turreted.
Later, Clegman was never quite able to decide just what convinced him that the five U F O's had no intention of passing over the base without launching an attack upon it. But something did—a warning signal deep in his mind, a premonition that he had no right to delay a counter-decision for another half minute. In the absence of the General—just where the General might be he did not even stop to ask himself—it was up to him.
The invading U F O's were committing an act of armed aggression by flying over an I B M base whether they knew it or not. And both consciously and unconsciously—deep in his mind—Clegman was overwhelmingly convinced that they did know it. It was a very big country. An I B M base was a mere pinpoint on the map and the presence of Unidentified Flying Objects in the sky above it could not possibly have been coincidental.
The long arm of coincidence could never stretch that far—not in a million years or anywhere in space or time.
It was up to Colonel Richard Clegman, who had earned his insignia the hard way on a smoke-blackened Flat Top. Being a man of strength and a man of decision, Clegman acted without hesitation and with no feeling of guilt. He gave the signal for the launching of an all-out guided missile and jet bomber attack.
Corporal Thomas Walton would always think of it as a day to remember. But if anyone had told him that he would occupy a full page in the elementary-school history books of the late twentieth century he would have refused to believe it, for he was an extraordinarily modest young man.
There can be no doubt, however, that a full page was no more than his due. Circumstances alone can create a legend, a hero-image, and when a man risks his life in a hazardous undertaking it is not too important that he is merely carrying out orders and performing a duty which he might, with complete freedom of choice, prefer to avoid.
Corporal Thomas Walton was the first United States soldier to see a Martian face to face.