“Keep a sharp eye open for pieces of rubber!” says an Air Force officer, as military personnel scour the wreckage at the crash site. “I’ll repeat that for you: keep a sharp eye open for pieces of rubber!”
An officer stands over the cockpit wreckage. “Major! Major Manchek!” he calls. Manchek walks over to the cockpit. “Take a look at that, sir,” the officer says to Manchek. Manchek reaches into the cockpit and pulls out a bone.
“It’s a human bone,” says Manchek, back at the command site. “Arm, I think.”
“Well, it’s picked clean – – almost like it was polished,” says General Sparks.
“That’s right,” says Manchek.
“Well, I don’t get it,” says Sparks.
“There is no actual rubber on the Phantom F-4, General,” says a civilian investigator. “It’s all a synthetic plastic compound called polycron. It has some of the characteristics of human skin.”
“What the hell is that?” asks Manchek, pointing at a plastic bag.
“What’s left of his oxygen mask,” says the investigator. “It’s made of polycron. I’d say it was done by a chemical reaction of some sort, or maybe a microorganism.”
“Meaning?” asks Sparks.
“Meaning there was something in that plane that consumes plastic,” says Manchek.
Sparks looks at Manchek.