Far Horizons: Tales of Sci-Fi, Fantasy and Horror. Issue #16 July 2015 | Page 22

Embedded, Part I
By Jeffrey Durkin

if the walls had been festooned with crosses and she
had had to walk through some sort of spiritual metal
detector, then it would be more plausible.

“… Pentagon Spokesman Jay Rawlings confirmed that elements of the US military have actively
engaged paranormal entities for years. “Since the first
days of our country, the men and women of the United
States Armed Services have protected the people of the
country from all threats, foreign and domestic,” Rawlings said during yesterday’s press conference. “Even
though some of these threats are not human doesn’t
change the fact that this mission continues.”
- Washington Post, 14 April 2017
“You understand the rules, right?”
Jessica Morlin had done this dance before. As
a reporter for Fox News, she had covered counter-terrorist operations in Afghanistan, had been with an
Israeli armoured unit during the 2014 fighting against
Hamas and rode shotgun with a Peshmerga scout team
in the fight against ISIS. The details might change,
but the rules for being embedded were the same. Stick
with your handler, do what you were told, get the story without breaching operational security and, above
all, don’t become a casualty. It looked bad for both the
network and military to lose a reporter.
“Of course, Colonel James. You know this
isn’t my first time at the rodeo.”
Jessica was being led by Colonel Mike James.
He led her through the winding corridors of Special
Forces Detachment Golf Hotel’s Operations Centre. Even with the revelations of the war against the
supernatural, the location of sites like the Operations
Centre were classified. Jessica couldn’t tell the public
that the government’s ghost hunting headquarters was
located on the outskirts of Washington, DC. From the
exterior, it looked like any other institutional building
that populated Andrews Air Force Base. Even inside,
there was nothing to distinguish it from other military
facilities Jessica had been in. The mundanity made
what she was doing hard to believe. She realised that

“At the rodeo… I like that. Well, this isn’t like
any other op you’ve ever covered. We’ll be clearing a
site of CEEs. That’s next-level stuff, compared to the
Taliban.”
Jessica nodded. Although she felt like the Colonel was patronising her a little, she admitted to herself this all did seem unbelievable. When the network
was offered the opportunity to cover a field operation
by the US Army’s ghost hunters they couldn’t say no.
And, she was the obvious choice, given her experience
in military affairs and her popularity in the Department of Defence. Plus, her girl-next-store cum cheerleader good looks made her very popular with the 18
- 25-year-old male demographic.
When her producer had said, “We want you to
embed with a team of Army ghost-busters,” she had
laughed at him. She had seen the recent press conferences and even been pre-sent at a few of them. It just
seemed like some kind of really bad joke; or, at the
very least, cover for more mundane operations. She
still half-expected to find out this was an elaborate
psychological warfare operation.
“Let’s start with that term,” she said. “CEE?”
“Coherent Electromagnetic Entity. That’s the
official title. Unofficially, there are a number of terms
used by the men. Caspers, Oscar Sierras…that’s Original Spooks…oh, and Golf’s, of course. That’s how we
got the detachment name.”
“Golf Hotel?”
ning.

“Right. Think about it,” the Colonel said, grin-

Jessica took a moment, then chuckled. “Right,
Golf Hotel. Ghost Hunters.”
“Exactly. The unit has gone through some
different names. Heck, back in the Eighties it was the

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