INGRID DOWS - AN ALTERNATE STORY PART 2 - THE JET AGE by Michel Poulin - HTML preview

Central grounds of the Pentagon

Arlington, Virginia, U.S.A.

Ingrid flew down with caution as she landed in the central grounds of the Pentagon, careful not to get too close to the few young trees which had been planted one year ago in what was meant to be an open-air relaxation area for the personnel working in the huge building. Alerted by radio of her arrival, General George Kenney and a military aide was on hand to greet her when she stepped out of her helicopter.

‘’Thank you for coming this quickly to Washington, Ingrid. Since it is already close to nine in the evening, your meeting with the me and the service chiefs will take place tomorrow morning. In the meantime, you and your copilot will spend the night at the officers’ accommodations in Fort Myers, where my driver will drive both of you. First, however, we must go talk in private in my office.’’

‘’Could Captain Walker be driven now to Fort Myers, sir, so that he could go take his room right away and rest?’’

‘’No problem, Ingrid! My aide will get him there right now, once your things are out of your helicopter.’

‘’That won’t take long, sir.’

Going inside the UH-1, Ingrid retrieved her kit bag, travel bag and briefcase, in which she transferred her precious classified file before following Kenney inside the Pentagon.

Thankfully, Ingrid had already visited once the huge building and thus didn’t feel completely lost as she walked with Kenney, who spoke to her in a low voice as they negotiated the long hallways of the Pentagon.

‘’There has been a change in time and place for tomorrow’s meeting of the service chiefs in which you will brief them on the information you have about Nancy Laplante’s atomic secrets: it wil now be held at the White House at one in the afternoon.

The President wants to hear what you have to say and the meeting was delayed so that

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the top scientist and the program manager for our atom bomb project could arrive from New Mexico and participate in the reunion.’

‘’So, I’m going to brief the President as well? No pressure!’

George Kenney smiled at her then.

‘’Come on, Ingrid: you already briefed tough crowds before. You can handle this.’

‘’If you say so, sir. By the way, I will have a few things to tell you in confidence once in your office.’

That made Kenney look at her while frowning but he didn’t say a thing then and continued walking.

They arrived at the Army Air Force section of the Pentagon after a few minutes of walking, with both of them then locking themselves up in Kenney’s office, where he and Ingrid sat facing each other.

‘’So, what are you hiding this time, Ingrid?’’ asked Kenney, most serious. Ingrid stared into his eyes while speaking in a resolute tone.

‘’Sir, about those atomic secrets Nancy was hiding from the British and which I suspect were stolen by the Brits, I not only knew about their existence: I read them as well. Nancy let me read them, so that I would learn the lessons from history about their deadly threat to Humanity and about their misuse.’

‘’What? When was that? Were you stil a German prisoner of war at that time?’

‘’Yes, I was. However, that was after I and Nancy had fully remembered our past incarnations. By then, me and Nancy were different persons, with progressively enhanced physical and mental abilities. We also could communicate telepathically with each other and could mutually read our minds, thus knew that we could fully trust each other. By then, I was not anymore simply a German girl prisoner of the British: I was Nancy’s newly adopted daughter.’

Kenney stared at Ingrid with somewhat of a blank look.

‘’What do you mean by ‘enhanced physical and mental abilities, Ingrid? I know already that you are strong for a girl and that you may have induced once a headache in a staff officer’s mind in Port Moresby. What else can you do, apart from remembering your past incarnations?’’

‘’I am not only just ‘strong for a girl’, sir: I am as strong as a big professional wrestler. Let me show you, sir.’

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Ingrid then put one elbow on Kenney’s desk and held her right forearm up at the vertical.

‘’Try to pul my arm down, sir.’

Kenney was stumped by her request but did take her offer and, putting his own right elbow on the desk, solidly grabbed her right hand with his right hand.

‘’You may regret that, Ingrid: I am no physical weakling, you know.’

‘’Blah, blah, blah! Give it your best shot, sir.’

‘’You asked for it, Ingrid.’ said Kenney just before he started to pul down her hand with all his strength. To his utter surprise, Ingrid’s hand didn’t move at all, as if it had been set in concrete. Redoubling his effort to the point of his face turning red, Kenney stil could not pul down Ingrid’s hand at all. She then smiled to him and started pul ing down Kenney’s hand, demonstrating an incredible strength worthy of a male weightlifter. It took her only one second to make Kenney’s hand slap against the desk top. She then released her hold and smiled to her stunned commander.

‘’Physical strength was not the only attribute which was enhance after I gained the memories of my past lives, sir: I am also faster, more resistant and also heal faster than normal. In the mental aspect, I can perceive the emotions around me and can read minds if close enough from the person doing the thinking. Don’t ask me how this happened or who was responsible for these changes, sir: I simply don’t know. I only know that Nancy also saw her abilities enhanced at the same time as me.

Unfortunately, she was killed before she could truly develop and control those new abilities. As for me, I have had three years to discreetly learn how to use them without letting others know about them. That episode in Port Moresby, when I induced a headache in that idiot at our command meeting, was a mistake by me: anger made me temporarily lose control of my mind. I now have learned to better control myself and such an incident will not happen again, unless I am forced to defend myself from a physical attack. Now, if this scares you and you deem that you can’t trust me anymore, then simply say so and I wil resign my commission on the spot, sir.’

His expression most sober, George Kenney stared at her in silence for a long moment before slowly shaking his head.

‘’No need for you to resign your commission, Ingrid. I still have full confidence in you and in your loyalty to the United States. I promise that what you just told me will not be repeated by me to anyone, ever!’

‘’Even to the President, sir?’’

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‘’Even to the President. I wil let you decide if you will one day want to reveal your secrets to him.’

‘’Thank you, sir. Now, what did you want to know about those atomic secrets Nancy was keeping to herself?’’

‘’How about telling me everything that you know about them, Ingrid?’

13:08 (Washington Time)

Thursday, June 08, 1944 ‘C’

The Cabinet Room, The White House’ West Wing

Washington, D.C.

President Roosevelt, rolling into the Cabinet Room in his wheelchair, smiled on seeing Ingrid, sitting around the long conference table with other generals, admirals and with Secretary of War Stimson and Doctor Robert Oppenheimer.

‘’Ha, General Dows! Your beauty would lighten the most depressing discussion on policies.’’

‘’Thank you, Mister President but flattery will get you nowhere.’’

Ingrid’s retort made F.D.R. and the other men in the room chuckle briefly before Roosevelt became serious once at his place at the end of the table.

‘’So, lady and gentlemen, I am told that the possible reason for the stunning demand by the British that we remove our units from British soil could be that they are about to get a working atomic bomb. Do we have facts to support that hypothesis?’’

Ingrid took on herself to reply to Roosevelt, without waiting for her military superiors to introduce her.

‘’I believe that we have, Mister President. This morning, before coming to the White House, I asked to review the various, apparently anodyne reports of sightings of unusual so-called ‘light flashes’ observed by our ships, aircraft and other witnesses around the more isolated parts of the World. One particular report from a month ago, from one of our cargo ships sailing through the South Atlantic, described a powerful but very distant and prolonged flash of intense white light coming from the direction of the South Georgia Islands, near the Antarctic Ocean, followed many minutes later by a deep rumble sound. Now, for those of you who are not familiar with the South Georgia Islands, know that they are British territories and are mostly uninhabited, save for a few meteorological stations and whaling harbors. Then, three weeks after that report, the

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British government issued its demands for us to vacate their bases in England. I believe that what was seen by our cargo ship was the flash from a successful atomic bomb test in or near the South Georgia Islands. Having succeeded into producing a working nuclear weapon would explain why the attitude of the British government hardened so suddenly and radically: Prime Minister Churchill believes that, with the atomic bomb in his arsenal, he can now dictate his political will to the rest of the World.’

While Roosevelt and a number of generals around the table seemed to take her seriously on this, a big, slightly overweight major general sitting next to Robert Oppenheimer, the top physicist on the American atomic bomb project, objected at once.

‘’Excuse me, General Dows, but how could you deduce so much from a single sighting report from the crew of a civilian cargo ship? Nobody has ever seen yet what a nuclear explosion even looks like.’

‘’Well, the British now have...as well as me.’

As the men around the table, including Roosevelt, froze in stunned surprise, Ingrid quickly extracted from her briefcase a black binder and opened it on the table, then sifted through the plastic page holders it contained and took out a particular color picture before raising it high to show it at the men around her.

‘’Mister President, gentlemen, this is a photo taken in the future of an American nuclear weapon test. It was given to me by Nancy Laplante before her death in 1941, after she had decided to adopt me. She also showed me at that same time a video recording of the said atomic test, using her laptop computer.’

Ingrid then got up and went to bring her picture to Roosevelt, who looked at it for long seconds before looking up at her, seriously shaken.

‘’Dear God! You decidedly know a lot more about many things than I thought possible, General Dows. How much did Nancy Laplante tell you about those atomic weapons?’’

‘’In terms of how exactly to build them? Little, Mister President. Please understand that what Nancy knew about nuclear weapons in 2012, 68 years from now, was what the public basically knew at that time. She knew about their general design principles and functioning but she, like myself, was no nuclear physicist. For us to produce our own atomic bomb will properly be the work of Doctor Oppenheimer and of his scientific team. May I circulate this picture around the table, Mister President?’’

‘’Please do, General Dows.’

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Ingrid nodded her head and passed her picture to Secretary of War Henry Stimson, who sat directly to the right of Roosevelt, then returned to her own place and sat down. As the picture went around the table, Ingrid addressed F.D.R. in a sober tone.

‘’Mister President, Nancy’s goal in showing me that video of an atomic bomb test was to pass a warning to me, a warning the World took decades to learn: basically, that nuclear weapons are good only to prevent their own use, while proving unable to prevent the dozens of conventional wars fought after the advent of nuclear weapons. In the decades after this present war, many American military and political leaders believed that just possessing a nuclear arsenal would make our conventional forces mostly unnecessary and would prevent other wars. In that, they were gravely mistaken.

Despite having both the United States, the Soviet Union and then a few more countries acquiring nuclear arsenals of ever-growing size and power, the World kept experiencing an unending string of minor and not so minor wars, either at local level or involving whole regions of the World. With both sides having nuclear weapons and with their use becoming near suicidal for everybody, wars by proxy between democracies and communist powers kept flaring up during the decades, some being quite bloody affairs.

At first, we made the mistake of relying too much on nuclear weapons, slashing our conventional arsenals of ships and tactical aircraft in order to pay for thousands of nuclear weapons and their delivery systems. Then, when faced with something like a jungle guerrilla war in Southeast Asia, or a civil war around the Middle East, we found ourselves ill equipped to respond to those conflicts. The lesson that History thought the hard way to Nancy and the people of the 21st Century is that we will always need our fleets of warships, our squadrons of tactical fighter-bombers and our Marine Corps units in order to keep the peace around the World. The spread of nuclear weapons was eventually slowed down and reversed via international arms reduction treaties but not before trillions of dollars had been wasted on them while they created the very real possibility that Humanity as a whole could be extinguished if some madman ever triggered a mass nuclear exchange.’’

Roosevelt and the other men around the table stared at Ingrid in silence for long seconds as they digested her words. The President then pointed at the black binder, now closed, in front of Ingrid.

‘’I saw that you had other color pictures in that binder, General Dows. What is that binder exactly?’’

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‘’That binder is the most precious gift Nancy gave me, next to her love towards me, Mister President. It represents the true future of our air force and that of aircraft in general. I am just starting my studies in aeronautical engineering at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Boston so that I could eventually help make that future a reality.’

She then asked the men to her right to pass on her binder to Roosevelt, who then slowly opened it. The first picture he saw was the unit logo of the 99th Air Wing, the winged female goblin named ‘Fifinel a’. Turning that page protector, he then was able to look at the color picture of a Lockheed SR-71 Mach 3 strategic reconnaissance aircraft on the left side, plus that of a F-22 supersonic interceptor on the right side. With blood rushing to his head, Roosevelt looked at those pictures for many seconds before looking in succession at the dozens of other pictures contained in the binder, then passed it to Secretary Stimson.

‘’Please pass it around after sifting through it, Henry.’

‘’Yes, Mister President.’

Roosevelt kept staring in silence at Ingrid while her binder was being circulated around the table, his mind in turmoil as he rehashed her warning about nuclear weapons in his head.

‘’General Dows, your wish to help direct the future of our air force and aircraft industry is dully noted by me and will be supported. Once you will have graduated from the M.I.T., be assured that you will have a heavy hand on the management of our future aircraft programs. If you prove as imaginative about aircraft designs as you are with military strategies and tactics, then our air force will have a great future. Now, to return to this business of new British attitude towards us and considering that the British may well have a functioning atomic bomb, what would you do to confront them if you were in my place, General?’’

‘’First, Mister President, I would continue to support our own atomic weapons project, so that we could acquire a counter to the British program as quickly as possible.

Second, I would make sure that the production of our most recent and modern conventional weapons, like our improved ESSEX-Class aircraft carrier, our EC-142E

flying command post aircraft and our Hughes A-11 fast medium bombers, continue, in order to both replenish our losses in this war and to replace existing models which proved outdated and ineffective, like our B-17 and B-24 heavy bombers.’

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‘’What about our jet aircraft programs, Ingrid?’’ asked George Kenney, who had just passed her binder to General Marshall. ‘’What would you do about them?’’

Her answer, given at once and without hesitation, surprised him and others around the table.

‘’Stop those programs already in progress and replace them with proper design studies for a number of families of new jet engines, General Kenney. What we are working on presently are merely copies of early British jet engine models, models that are in my opinion quite mediocre. For example, the present British Gloster METEOR jet fighter is actually slower than our A-11 fast propeller medium bombers. In the couple of decades after this war we, like many other countries, made the mistake of trying to design new aircraft without waiting for corresponding proper jet engines to be designed and perfected. As a result, a number of aircraft projects which could have been great ones were sunk by anemic and unreliable jet engines developed on the run by management teams lacking in vision and true technical competence, with most of these program managers being too often senior air force generals still holding on to old concepts. While not yet a qualified aeronautical engineer, I have already been studying on my own time for a couple of years the basic principles and lessons on aircraft designs and aerodynamics, plus got personal lessons from Nancy on those subjects while she was still alive. I also am an experience combat user of aircraft and even shot down myself a number of German jet fighters in this war. I believe that we should first design and test a variety of classes of jet engines before we seriously start designing new aircraft, so that we could avoid a series of costly, embarrassing aircraft program failures.

We need to learn to walk first before we try to run, gentlemen. We already have as parts of the Hourglass Files we possess here in Washington quite a lot of data on the modern jet engines of Nancy’s time, as well as descriptions of many modern jet aircraft and air-launched missiles. We certainly can use all that data to guide us through our new jet engines and jet aircraft programs. We should thus study in priority five classes of jet engines: a supersonic augmented turbofan engine of about twelve-ton maximum thrust to equip fighter-bombers; a subsonic, high-bypass turbofan engine in the 25-ton class for heavy transport aircraft and passenger liners; a hypersonic turbofan-ramjet combo engine for high supersonic bombers; a small medium-bypass turbofan engine of about three tons of maximum thrust to power smaller subsonic aircraft and, finally, a 5,000-plus shaft horsepower turbopropulsor to equip fast propeller aircraft like long-haul cargo aircraft and maritime patrol aircraft. Now, before anyone orders me to stop my studies in

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order to direct and manage those engine programs, I would implore that I be allowed to get my engineering degree as fast as possible before I start working on those programs full time. I would also want to have the chance to fly from time to time during my studies, so that I could keep my present flying qualifications.’

While quite a few of the generals present looked skeptical about her claims and opinions, both Roosevelt and Kenney appeared to find her ideas credible. Kenney then looked at F.D.R. and spoke up.

‘’Mister President, I believe that I can arrange a way for General Dows to continue her studies unimpeded while using her counsels and suggestions to start those new jet engine programs.’

‘’Then, go for it, General Kenney. Once she will have graduated from the M.I.T., I want her to head our new aircraft and jet engine programs full time, independently of the other departments of the Army Air Force involved in aircraft design and production management. I realize that this could ruffle the feathers of quite a few of our senior air force generals but, right now, we have to face the challenge the British threw in our face and I don’t care about wounded egos. We need her vision and understanding of the future in order to develop our future aircraft.’’

‘’It will be done, Mister President.’’

‘’One last thing on that subject, General Kenney. I want you to stay at the head of our air force for at least the next four years, to ensure that no one derails those new engines and aircraft programs, for whatever reasons.’’

Henry Stimson nodded his head at that, understanding that this directive would mostly fall on him to enforce.

With the other participants to the meeting now understanding how highly supported Ingrid was now, they then apparently took her a lot more seriously as the group discussed in detail how to boost and accelerate ‘Project Manhattan’, the present American atomic bomb project, and how to reequip and restructure the American forces while the war in the Pacific and Asia went on. When the meeting concluded after over four hours of discussion, Roosevelt called Ingrid and George Kenney at his side as the other participants filed out of the Cabinet Room. F.D.R. then looked soberly at Ingrid.

‘’General Dows, I wish I could use you right now full time as a presidential advisor but I do realize how important you may become for the future of our air forces. I wish you the best for your studies at the M.I.T. You may now return to Boston.’

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‘’Thank you, Mister President.’ replied Ingrid, who then came to attention and saluted him before leaving the room with George Kenney.

Ingrid ended up returning by car to the M.I.T. after flying back to Logan Airport in her UH-1, arriving in her room at Bexley Hall while dressed back in civilian clothes and hauling her kit bag, travel bag and briefcase. Betty Woods, who was coming out of the shower and was about to go to bed, looked at her with a bit of worry as Ingrid walked into their room and locked the door behind her.

‘’So, how did your visit to Washington go, Ingrid?’

‘’Better than I actual y hoped for, Betty. I wil be a pretty busy girl for the next four years and beyond.’’

Betty nodded at that, then let drop the large towel rolled around her torso, uncovering her naked body, while smiling to Ingrid.

‘’I will give you something else to be busy about, Ingrid. Go take a shower before going to bed: I wil help you soap and rub up.’

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CHAPTER 3 – FIRST CLASSES

08:56 (Boston Time)

Monday, June 12, 1944 ‘C’

Aeronautical Engineering Department’s auditorium Building # 33, M.I.T. campus, Cambridge

Massachusetts, U.S.A.

Peter Simpson couldn’t believe his luck when, as he was about to enter the auditorium where he and other students in aeronautical engineering were about to get their first class of this Summer session, he saw the young and beautiful girl he had met at the swim test last Tuesday. Going in behind her and hoping to find a seat next to her, he was disappointed when she sat in the last place available in one of the rows adjacent to the central aisle. He however was able to grab one of the seats on the row behind her row, only two seats to one side from her. That gave him a good view down in her direction while staying out of her direct field of view. In that, he was not alone to jockey for places near her, as she was the only girl present in this class.

Their teacher, a man in his late forties and with a balding head, smiled with amusement on seeing the male stares that his sole female student attracted. He had to concede that the girl was indeed very beautiful. Knowing who she was exactly only widened Doctor Richard Goodale’s smile. He had personally interviewed the girl and had reviewed her application and various school certificates and entrance qualifications exams in order to allow her to start her M.I.T. studies in this Summer session, rather than make her wait until the Fall semester. Once all of his students were seated in the amphitheater, Goodale rapped his knuckles three times on the blackboard behind him to attract their attention.

‘’YOUR ATTENTION PLEASE, LADY AND GENTLEMEN!’

Silence fell quickly, allowing him to continue in a more normal volume of voice.

‘’Welcome to this M.I.T. aeronautical engineering department Summer session.

For those who don’t know me yet, I am Doctor Richard Goodale, head of the aeronautical engineering department. You have all certainly noticed that a young

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woman is part of our engineering class. While women are still rare in our domain, I am certain that this will change rapidly in the coming years and I certainly welcome them in aeronautical engineering, a specialty with a bright and fascinating future indeed. Miss Ingrid Dows, your new student colleague, is here to study and I suspect that she will appreciate if you won’t harass her constantly with the view of dating her. Concentrate on your own studies and let her concentrate on her studies and you will make me happy. I will now review your session program schedule and speak a bit about the materiel in it.

Then, at ten, you will get your first class in basic engineering…’’

12:08 (Boston Time)

Students’ cafeteria, Lobdell Student Center

Peter Simpsons didn’t have a chance to speak to Ingrid before lunchtime came.

Following her in the cafeteria of the Lobdell Student Center, Peter got served at the food counter, then gathered his courage and approached Ingrid’s table, stopping in front of it and smiling down to her.

‘’Excuse me, miss. Could I sit at your table?’

Ingrid returned his smile, admiring discreetly the 181-centimeter-tall boy with blond hair and gray eyes, whom she remembered from her swimming test.

‘’But of course! Please, sit down!’’

Peter put his food tray down on the table, then sat down facing Ingrid before offering his right hand.

‘’My name is Peter Simpsons. You probably saw me in the aeronautical engineering class this morning.’

‘’Effectively! I also remember you from our swim test of last Tuesday. Ingrid Dows, happy to know you.’ replied Ingrid while shaking his hand. There was then a moment of silence as they looked at each other, until Peter finally spoke again.

‘’I noticed that you were the only girl in our class, and one of the rare girls at M.I.T. What attracted you to aeronautical engineering, Ingrid?’

Ingrid gave him a warm look with her big blue eyes that nearly melted him.

‘’I have been fascinated by planes since my youth. I also obtained my private pilot’s license in 1941 and want to know more about the technical aspect of aircraft.’

‘’You are a qualified pilot? Great! I envy you! It must be fascinating to fly.’

‘’To be frank, flying is my passion, Peter.’

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They then ate a few bites before Peter spoke, a bit hesitant.

‘’Uh, do you mind if I ask you if you reside on campus, Ingrid?’

‘’Not at all! I have a room in the girls’ wing of Bexley Hall, on the fourth floor: Room 419. And you, Peter?’’

Peter smiled at that.

‘’I also lodge in Bexley Hall, on the second floor: Room 208. My roommate is however a bit of a noisy guy: he is one of these football player types who are in love with their own muscles. And you, do you have a roommate?’’

‘’Yes, I do! Betty is a quiet, decent girl and she studies biology. And you, Peter, what attracted you to aeronautical engineering?’’

‘’Well, I also love planes, even though I am no pilot. I believe that aviation is a domain with a bright future, as Doctor Goodale said.’’

‘’I believe so as wel . My dream is to one day be able to pilot an aircraft that I will have helped design.’’

‘’A fine dream indeed, Ingrid. I am sure that it wil come through one day.’

That made her smile again in a way that accelerated Peter’s heartbeat. Not wanting to tempt too much his luck at first, Peter didn’t ask her then about her private life, staying on banalities or on the subject of aircraft during the rest of the meal.

19:29 (Boston Time)

Female quarters, Bexley Hall

M.I.T., Cambridge

Betty Woods put down her backpack full of books on her work desk and then sat down on her bed, which faced Ingrid’s bed in their small room.

‘’Thank God! No assignments or mandatory reading tonight. I came out easy today. And you, Ingrid?’

‘’The same here. I however believe that this wil change quickly, Betty, probably starting tomorrow. By the way, if a boy named Peter Simpson comes knocking on our door and asks for me, don’t chase him away, please.’’

Betty made a malicious smirk on hearing that.

‘’Hum, chasing boys too? At this rate, you won’t get bored at night at the M.I.T.’’

‘’Hey, life is too short to waste it. Let’s get all the fun that we can find while we stil can find it.’

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23:19 (London Time)

Friday, June 23, 1944 ‘C’

Blueprints drawing section, Roll-Royce jet engine factory Bristol, Somerset County