Eben
Not to be confused with
Eban
,
Reticulians
,
Solipsi Rai
,
Do-Hu
, or
Zeta Reticulans
.
This article is about the alleged peaceful Zeta Reticuli I species described in Project SERPO accounts. For the broader Grey species of Zeta Reticuli, see
Reticulians
. For the Cygnus species in Zeta Reticuli space, see
Solipsi Rai
. For the Danaan-described Zeta Reticuli M-2 species, see
Do-Hu
.
The Eben (singular Ebeni) are a non-human species from the planet Selpo in the Zeta Reticuli I system, not classified as Greys and unrelated to the other Grey species of that system, with no reptiloid DNA. Originally from Azrata (also in the Zeta Reticuli I system), they relocated to Selpo after volcanic activity and orbital instability made their homeworld uninhabitable.
Shorter than 1.30 metres, Ebeni have thin mouths, small noses, four-fingered hands and feet, and skin that is not grey but rather light brown or pale blue; their large oval eyes are green or blue, covered with dark protective lenses when travelling. Their skin is notably thick, adapted to a hot atmosphere high in carbon, which they recreated on Selpo by modifying the planet's environment. Ebeni are a peaceful, calm, and curious people; they have a cultural affinity for the colour blue, a secondary colony in the Barnard star system, and fly discoidal ships with a high module above and beneath, flat-roofed.
Project SERPO and first contact
The U.S. government first encountered the Eben following the 1947 Roswell incident of 1947, designating the sole survivor EBE-1 (Extraterrestrial Biological Entity One). EBE-1 did not communicate through words but through tonal variations described as high-pitched, almost harmonic singing; after lengthy effort, scientists at Los Alamos achieved translation through picture graphs. EBE-1 died in June 1952, but not before providing coordinates and enabling the recovery of a communication device from the crash debris.
A second Eben craft landed at White Sands Missile Range on 24 April 1964 for a formal diplomatic meeting. Among the delegation was an Eben designated EBE-2 — identified as female — who had already learned to speak near-fluent English and served as interpreter; she also presented the Yellow Book, a transparent rectangle that, when activated by its user's gaze, displayed images and text describing the cosmos, the Eben home system Serpo, and the long history of contact between Ebens and humans. The Eben also returned nine bodies of their fallen comrades (four of which had been autopsied by the U.S.) and agreed to a date for the exchange program: July 15, 1965, at the Nevada Test Site.
This first-contact sequence is corroborated in broad outline by the classified Project Aquarius briefing document (TS/ORCON), which records that the 1949 alien crash survivor — there designated simply "EBE" — came from a planet in the Zeta Reticuli star system approximately 40 light years from Earth, lived until June 18, 1952, and during that time provided information on space technology, the origins of the universe, and exobiological matters.
Society and culture on Serpo
Per accounts attributed to the twelve-member exchange team (see Project SERPO), Eben society on Serpo is disciplined and highly structured, governed by a council of governors with no defined currency and no crime; a single device worn on a belt by every citizen appears to track and regulate each individual's activities. The approximately 650,000 Ebens on Serpo are divided into small communities, each centred on a clock-tower that structures daily activity; the society is further stratified into closed knowledge castes — engineers hold a monopoly on physics and interplanetary travel, doctors on science and biology — while the average Eben simply carries out an assigned task for life, showing no individual creativity despite a measured average IQ of 165. The planet Serpo orbits two suns — one brighter than the other — has no night cycle as humans know it and extreme equatorial heat (over 107°F recorded by the team), but contains polar regions with mountains up to 15,000 ft, snow, and fauna including a large ox-like animal and a deadly 15-foot serpent with near-human eyes. Eben propulsion is believed to use antimatter reactions powered by a super-heavy element designated Element 115, consistent with what Bob Lazar later described from his work at S-4.
Captivity and chlorophyll-based physiology
William Cooper's Behold a Pale Horse (1991), as recorded in the audiobook edition, provides an alternative account of the Roswell survivor designated "Eb" — a name suggested by Vannevar Bush as a shorthand for Extraterrestrial Biological Entity. Per Cooper, Eb was initially uncooperative: "Eb had a tendency to lie and for over a year would give only the desired answer to questions asked." During his second year of captivity he became more forthcoming, and the resulting information "became the foundation of what would later be called the Yellow Book." Photographs of Eb were taken and viewed by Cooper years later in Project Grudge. In late 1951 Eb became ill; medical personnel could not diagnose the cause, leading to consultation with botanists and entomologists alongside physicians. Cooper identifies Eb's physiology as chlorophyll-based: "his system was chlorophyll based and he processed food into energy much the same as plants" — a detail corroborated in broad terms by the Project SERPO documentary's description of the Eben's need for a carbon-rich, hot-atmosphere environment recreated on Selpo.
Physical distinctions from Grey species
Independent commentators have emphasized that the Eben are morphologically distinct from other Grey-type species recovered from crashes. A detailed visual analysis published on the Real Leak channel noted that even the hands, finger length, number of fingers and toes differ between Eben specimens and other Grey humanoids — "these two humanoids look completely different from each other... they don't come from the same place." The same source observed that at least one Eben specimen appeared to be "in the custody of United States authorities" and was "not exactly a free being," and referenced leaked footage showing "multiple Ebens walking together during this very highly classified meeting" — a likely reference to the 1964 White Sands diplomatic encounter.
Yellow Book and Orion Cube
The Yellow Book — also known as the Orion Cube — is described as an 8-by-8-inch square cube functioning as a quantum viewing device: once activated following specific protocols, it could display the probabilities of future events. According to Dan Burisch researcher Michael Schratt, the device was provided by P-52 Orion representatives during a 1954 treaty meeting with President Eisenhower, and was at one point stored at S-4 Level 4-1 before being moved to the Scottish Rite Masonic Temple outside Washington, D.C.
Catalogued species and crash retrieval context
U.S. Army Sgt. Clifford Stone, who was trained with a classified first-aid manual covering 57 catalogued extraterrestrial species, identified among those species a category closely corresponding to the Eben description: beings that "look very much like you and myself that could walk among us and you wouldn't even notice the difference except for some of the things that they might be able to go ahead even in a dark room and touch an object and identify what colour that object might be," combined with beings of at least three distinct Grey morphotypes — including some "much taller than we were." Stone's EBE encounters across 22 years of crash retrieval work never produced a confirmed Eben specimen, as the Eben's peaceful culture and avoidance of military contact distinguished them from the Grey-type EBEs that appeared in crash scenarios.
Criticism of the Serpo narrative
UFO researcher Bill Hamilton, interviewed by Project Camelot in 2006, expressed scepticism about the scientific plausibility of the Project SERPO account. Hamilton noted that the narrative described a planet orbiting Zeta Reticuli with two suns at approximately the same distance as Earth's sun — an impossibility given that Zeta Reticuli 1 and 2 are separated by over 9,000 astronomical units, more than a light year apart. He also criticized the claim that the Eben lacked precise timekeeping devices despite possessing interstellar-capable spacecraft: "You can't have advanced technology without extremely precise clocks and timing mechanisms. You can't even have a computer without that, much less a spacecraft that travels light years."