Committed Hero
Adventurer
Los Angeles, California
January 20, 1953
It's early morning here, although on the East Coast the inaugural festivities for the newest president, Dwight Eisenhower, have been going on for a few hours. All of you have been summoned to a windowless room on the second floor of the LA field office - and not one of the more glamorous rooms, either. At least the bureacratic maneuvers that brought you all here carried the unspoken promise that you might be given the opportunity to get ahead in the Justice Department.
It's hard to trust those instincts now, sitting in this bare room with several strangers. One man, who looks like he’s running things, finally closes the door and clears his throat before speaking.
“Good morning, agents. My name is Arthur Dales. I am the SAC of a new and rather unorthodox task force here in the bureau. Many people have fought long and hard for such a group to exist, and there are plenty of others who wouldn’t mind if we fail. So let me say first off that I appreciate your willingness to try something new.
“There is a file room in the basement of the Justice Building. It contains all sorts of unsolved cases that someone decides are not a long term threat to any citizens. But even then, there is a large subset of cases with no logical explanation. Rumors of ghosts, or little green men, or – well, just about anything that comes after reason is cast aside for a stiff drink. There are a couple of old ones, but the Director filed his first in 1946 – a suspected case of lycanthropy in the Northwest. If you don’t know what that is, get a good dictionary.
“Anyway, he began sticking these files in U-W drawer, under ‘Unexplained Phenomena.’ When I finally got my chance to take a look at them, they were overflowing. Apparently, too many ‘Ws’ were in the same place – so I took some initiative and moved them down to the next drawer. The one that starts with X.
“It will be our job to investigate cases that are destined for this drawer. By the time they get there, everyone else has given up on them. Now, I can’t guarantee that the things you shall deal with will make sense, but I’d like you to keep an open mind just the same. Rest assured, even your wildest theories will pale before what some of us have experienced in our time.
"Any questions?”
January 20, 1953
It's early morning here, although on the East Coast the inaugural festivities for the newest president, Dwight Eisenhower, have been going on for a few hours. All of you have been summoned to a windowless room on the second floor of the LA field office - and not one of the more glamorous rooms, either. At least the bureacratic maneuvers that brought you all here carried the unspoken promise that you might be given the opportunity to get ahead in the Justice Department.
It's hard to trust those instincts now, sitting in this bare room with several strangers. One man, who looks like he’s running things, finally closes the door and clears his throat before speaking.
“Good morning, agents. My name is Arthur Dales. I am the SAC of a new and rather unorthodox task force here in the bureau. Many people have fought long and hard for such a group to exist, and there are plenty of others who wouldn’t mind if we fail. So let me say first off that I appreciate your willingness to try something new.
“There is a file room in the basement of the Justice Building. It contains all sorts of unsolved cases that someone decides are not a long term threat to any citizens. But even then, there is a large subset of cases with no logical explanation. Rumors of ghosts, or little green men, or – well, just about anything that comes after reason is cast aside for a stiff drink. There are a couple of old ones, but the Director filed his first in 1946 – a suspected case of lycanthropy in the Northwest. If you don’t know what that is, get a good dictionary.
“Anyway, he began sticking these files in U-W drawer, under ‘Unexplained Phenomena.’ When I finally got my chance to take a look at them, they were overflowing. Apparently, too many ‘Ws’ were in the same place – so I took some initiative and moved them down to the next drawer. The one that starts with X.
“It will be our job to investigate cases that are destined for this drawer. By the time they get there, everyone else has given up on them. Now, I can’t guarantee that the things you shall deal with will make sense, but I’d like you to keep an open mind just the same. Rest assured, even your wildest theories will pale before what some of us have experienced in our time.
"Any questions?”
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