Cecelia Wheeler, Writer 

Sloan Grant(s) Received: 2024, Columbia University, Screenwriting Award

Project Type: Feature 

Genre: Mystery

Length: 102 pages 

Field of Science: Biology

Stage: Development 

Synopsis: 

In 1979 New Mexico, a ranch hand, HERNANDEZ (35, Mexican), fires at mysterious lights in the sky at the behest of ranch owner CARL WILSON (50s) before discovering the mutilated corpse of a cow. In Washington D.C., FBI Assistant Director JOHN CHILDERS (40s) assigns special agent JAMES ROLLAND (52) to investigate the mutilation, the latest in a spree of strange cattle deaths that have begun to cause national panic.

Rolland meets officer EMILIO LUNA (35) at the Martinez Ranch, the site of the first documented mutilation. ERNESTO MARTINEZ (40s) reveals photos of the mutilated cows, many marred by a white haze. Rolland goes through Luna’s old files. Childers meets with New Mexican Senator Henry Powell, a former astronaut up for re-election that year who wants the mutilation case solved.

At Wilson’s ranch, Rolland is frustrated to discover Wilson has disposed of the mutilated cow’s carcass: Wilson believes juvenile delinquents from the reservation are responsible. Rolland attends a UFOlogist meeting where a speaker theorizes that the government has intercepted alien aircraft. Meanwhile Luna tracks down Hernandez, discovering Wilson quietly fired him after the aircraft he hit turned out to be a Bureau of Land Management helicopter. Hernandez reveals that the mutilated cow on Wilson’s land was not the first.

Rolland and Luna investigate missing cattle on MANUEL DOSELA’s ranch and find a dead dog and five dead cows. Rolland’s photos of them come back with the same white haze as before. Back at Wilson’s ranch, Luna discovers that Wilson has been letting his cows graze illegally on government land. Rolland meets with Senator Powell, who jokingly gives Rolland a copy of Stigmata, a magazine put out by local UFOlogist PAUL WEAVER (40s). The magazine contains diagrams of a secret alien base beneath the nearby Archuleta Mesa, as well as a photo of a two-headed lamb, specimen courtesy of veterinary pathologist Dr. Prine. That night, Rolland witnesses the lights in the sky for the first time. Rolland and Luna seek Weaver out at a UFOlogist conference in Albuquerque, but Weaver is frightened by Rolland’s presence and flees.

Rolland tracks down Dr. JULIE PRINE (38), the pathologist mentioned in Stigmata, who studies animal decomposition. Rolland is called into the precinct after Luna finds two teenage boys cutting up a dead cow – they swear they were only copying the mutilations from the news as a practical joke. Dr. Prine necropsies the cow. That night, Rolland hears an aircraft outside his room and drives through the desert in pursuit: his chase is interrupted when he hits a military checkpoint and is detained by suspicious officers. Prine’s photos from the necropsy come back marred by the white haze. She sends tissue samples to a lab to check for radiation that may have interfered with the images. Rolland and Luna realize that the ranches where the cows have been found all border the military base that Rolland encountered. Rolland reveals he is haunted by his complicity in the deaths of thousands of Japanese soldiers during the Battle of Corregidor in WWII.

Prine finds radioactive isotopes in the tissue samples. Luna and Rolland drive out to Weaver’s cabin, only to find him dead. Rolland discovers photographs of the military base with a giant crater in the ground next to it, labeled “crash site.” Rolland drives to the border of the government land and climbs the fence, making the long hike in the growing dark up the mountain. When he reaches the top, he sees the enormous crater below, before a military helicopter descends on him.

Rolland is held at the base by COLONEL MATTHEW FAIRFIELD (50s), who explains that he has found the site where a twenty-nine ton nuclear weapon was detonated, causing sizable radioactive fallout. Rolland is instructed not to reveal this, and removed from the investigation. Rolland attempts to appeal to Powell, citing the danger to the public of the contaminated land and cattle, who reassures Rolland that he will take care of it. The Department of Agriculture begins having ranchers slaughter and burn cattle that were grazed on the government land, saying the animals were exposed to Blackleg, a common and highly contagious disease that lives in soil. Rolland decides to blow the whistle, sending his findings to the Santa Fe Sun. We conclude in 1980, with footage of Powell losing the election to his environmentalist opponent, and a sign newly erected at the crater, designating it as the site of Project Gasbuggy and informing the public what took place there.