extraordinary%20encounters

each other and, most of all, on surface humans,
whom they sometimes kidnap for torture
and other unpleasant purposes. The bulk
of the Shaver mystery material was published,
mostly as true, in two science-fiction magazines,
Amazing Stories and Fantastic Adven -
tures, in the mid- to late 1940s.
Few other people claim to have encountered
deros. The late John J. Robinson, a New
Jersey man with a longstanding interest in
UFOs and the paranormal, often told the
story of Steve Brodie, who had his own horrifying,
and possibly ultimately fatal, dealings
with the deros.
Ac c o rding to Robinson, in 1944 he was
living on the third floor of a Jersey City
house. Di rectly beneath him on the second
floor was a re c l u s i ve individual, St e ve Bro d i e ,
who claimed to be an artist. Over time,
Robinson won his trust, and the two often
spoke. Among Bro d i e’s quirks was his ave rsion
to meat; and more unusual, as Ro b i n s o n
recalled, “he seemed to be afraid that someone
might be attempting to sneak up behind
him.” When he walked on the street, he
walked in the middle of the street, apparently
out of fear that someone might jump
out of an alley or a doorw a y. On several occasions,
Robinson watched Brodie paint.
Sometimes the artist would enter a trancelike
state and create we i rd, otherworldly landscapes
that looked nothing like the paintings
he did in ord i n a ry consciousness. Asked
w h e re these images came from, Bro d i e
replied, “I don’t know. I feel as if I paint
these pictures from memory. It’s like I can
close my eyes and let it.”
Once Brodie seemed startled when he saw
Robinson with an issue of Amazing Stories in
his coat pocket. Robinson, who was closely
following the Shaver mystery tales the magazine
was running, launched into an explanation
of Shaver’s claims. When he heard the
word “dero,” Brodie blanched. “He writes of
the dero!” he exclaimed. Robinson persuaded
Brodie to explain his remark. Reluctantly,
after securing assurances that Robinson would
not ridicule him, he related something that
Brodie’s deros 49
had happened to him and a friend seven years
before.
The two had gone to a western state in
search of semiprecious stones. Local people
warned them to stay away from a certain
desert mesa because several individuals who
had gone there were never seen again. Disregarding
these words of caution, the young
men repaired to the site and spent the next
few days energetically stone-hunting. Finally,
one day, hearing his companion shout, Brodie
looked up to see a figure in a black cowl
standing at the base of the mesa. Another figure
joined the first. The first of them pointed
a rodlike device at Brodie, who abruptly felt
himself paralyzed. His friend began to run,
and the other figure pointed a rod at him. To
his horror the smell of burning human flesh
rose up in Brodie’s nostrils. He never saw his
friend again.
A third figure, holding what looked like
earphones, approached Brodie and then
walked past him. He felt something being
placed just beneath his ears just before he lost
consciousness. “At this point in his narrative,”
Robinson said, “Steve showed me why he
wore his hair long at the back of his head. Behind
each ear at the base of the parietal bones
of his skull were bare, seared, scarred patches
of skin upon which no hair could grow. Both
of these areas behind the ears were a little
smaller than the size of a silver dollar and were
perfectly circular. Steve said they were the
marks of a dero slave!”
In the ordeal that followed, Brodie was
only intermittently conscious. On three or
four occasions, he awoke to find himself in a
cage with other human beings. They told him
that he was “in the caves,” and they were
under the control of the “deros,” who could
snatch any human being off the face of the
earth if they so chose. Each time it became evident
that he was conscious, a black-cowled
figure would zap him back into oblivion.
Then one day he found himself walking
down a street in New York City with no idea
how he had gotten there. He was dressed in
his prospecting clothes. His personal items