UNSETIC Files: Bering Songs and Silence

By Erin M. Klitzke

There are things on Earth and beyond that aren’t yet understood. Brigid O’Connell started to realize that when she watched her friend Jade miraculously heal a dying pilot on the deck of an aircraft carrier–an act that no one but she and Jade can remember. The only way for her to find out why is to join UNSETIC–the organization that keeps the strange on the down-low so humanity can sleep at night.
Tim McConaway disappeared from the Persian Gulf during the second Gulf War nearly three years ago. Brigid was part of the team that searched for him–and never found a trace of him, either the pilot or his plane. When she finds herself partnered with the haunted Air Force officer, she has to wonder which will be the bigger mystery: their assignment to investigate reports of a mysterious creature sighted off a research post in the Bering Sea, or the man she’s been assigned to work with.
They’ll both have to come to terms with his demons if they’re going to survive their assignment beyond the Arctic Circle.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Erin M. Klitzke
• Release date: Jan 4, 2013
• ISBN: 9781301976751

Erin M. Klitzke

Erin M. Klitzke has been writing since she was an adolescent, though most of those early works will never see the light of day. She got her BA in history and anthropology from Grand Valley State University and her MA in history from Oakland University, and much to her mother’s occasional dismay, what she does with those degrees is write fiction. She lives in Detroit’s northern suburbs and enjoys reading, sewing, gaming, and renaissance festivals when she’s not creating her own worlds. You can find her on the web at www.embklitzke.com, e-mail her at doc (at) embklitzke (dot) com, and follow her on Twitter at @EMBKDoc.

Book preview

UNSETIC Bering Songs and Silence.jpg

Bering Songs and Silence

One of the UNSETIC Files

by

Erin M. Klitzke

Smashwords Edition

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Taliesin Ambrose Books

Copyright 2013 Erin M. Klitzke

This is a work of fiction, one that deals with themes of religion and the paranormal.  All resemblance to actual individuals, living or dead, is coincidental.

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Table of Contents

Cover

Bering Songs and Silence

Dedication

The Oath

One

Two

Three

Four

Five

Six

Seven

Eight

Epilogue

About the Author

Other works by Erin M. Klitzke

Dedication

To the ISRP crowd...thank you.

Oath of the United Nations Supernatural and Extraterrestrial Investigative Corps

I solemnly declare and promise to exercise all loyalty, discretion and conscience while carrying out the functions entrusted to me as an international agent of the United Nations Supernatural and Extraterrestrial Investigative Corps, to discharge my duties and regulate my conduct with the interest of the United Nations and my planet only in my view.  I understand that at times, I will be called upon to defend myself with force but forswear the overuse of deadly force, to be used only when necessary to defend the lives and persons of innocents and my comrades at arms.

I do so swear to defend my world against all threats foreign and domestic as directed by my superiors within the Corps and the United Nations.  I understand where this oath conflicts with any oath of service to military, security, or other organization that my loyalty to my conscience and my comrades should come first.

I will protect those who cannot protect themselves from threats seen and unseen to my dying breath.  This is my solemn oath and vow.

Bering Songs and Silence

Brigid O'Connell and Timothy McConaway

One

I can remember thinking that they probably should have hung a sign on the door that read X-Files in here. As it was, the office behind the steel door at the bottom of the stairs was small, windowless, and spartanly decorated though that didn’t necessarily make it uncomfortable.

What made it uncomfortable was knowing that I’d volunteered for this—whatever this turned out to be.

Of course, I hadn’t had many alternatives.

I sat in the hard wooden chair in front of the desk, staring at the fifty-something man behind it, his hands folded in front of him. He didn’t smile as he stared right back at me.

We’re waiting on another.

Oh. I folded my hands, staring at them. What am I doing here? What am I getting myself into? I must be insane.

The door behind me opened. I looked over my shoulder. The man that walked in was slightly older than I was, eyes haunted, face gaunt, a healing cut on his lip and fading bruises on his jaw and neck. I knew him.

He was supposed to be dead.

He was in the Gulf with us. One of the ones we looked for. Merlin.

The Gulf had been two years ago this past summer.

I’d known one of the two pilots who’d gone down, Mat O’Brien. He’d been my friend. The man next to me, Merlin, had been his. Mat had introduced us at a party back while we were at the Academy. I’d all but forgotten his friend until one hot summer day near the Bosporus. The day two planes from two duty stations went down over the Iraqi desert.

We’d searched for the two downed planes for six weeks, found the wreckage of one. That had been Matthias O’Brien’s plane. Not Merlin’s. We never found any sign of Merlin’s.

And now here he is, big as life and definitely still breathing. How is that possible?

The pilot I barely remembered moved stiffly, sat down slowly in the chair next to me. He didn’t look at me, just stared straight ahead as if I didn’t exist. Stared at the man who was our new boss.

Why did I volunteer for this?

It was simple, though. I was a part of this because I’d seen someone turn a mortal wound into a minor wound and gone looking for answers. It was all downhill from there.

Doubt must have been written all over my face, though, because the man behind the desk pinned me to my chair with his gaze.

You’ve been working for us for the past three years, Lieutenant O’Connell, Paul Ballard said quietly. You just didn’t know it. He looked toward the man next to me. Are you sure you’re up to this, Lieutenant McConaway?

He’s out of uniform. Part of me was surprised that he was still with the service. He’s been missing for thirty months. Where has he been? How did he survive? How did he disappear? Where did he hide?

I got no answers to any of those questions as the man next to me nodded slightly. Yes, sir. His voice was quiet. I’d assumed I’d be assigned someone from the Air Force to work with, though.

Ballard inclined his head. That was the intention, but Lieutenant O’Connell’s potential partner tried to get himself blown up and yours is dead. The assignment can’t wait for us to find a new partner for either one of you, so you’re stuck with each other.

Blown up? I hope it was doing whatever he did before he got recruited into this spook-factory. I took a deep, silent breath, knowing that neither man would notice it unless they were watching too closely—and neither was. What’s the assignment, sir? I asked quietly.

You haven’t reconsidered volunteering, then, Lieutenant?

I glanced toward Timothy McConaway, studied him for a long moment. There were rumors about what had happened to him in the Gulf, but I’d never believed any of them. From the look of him now, whatever had happened back then hadn’t left him whole.

But he’s still in the service, apparently. Maybe. I nodded, almost to myself. Inches and miles. I’m not sure I’ve