Episode Transcript
Records of the Unknown, Operation Latency, contains horror elements that may be disturbing to some listeners.
Listener discretion is advised.
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November 19th, 1.15 PM.
Corporal Adams, you are standing in the room. It is just you, Abe Rogers, and this small, amorphous blobby substance that's rolling down the wall, leaving chunks of itself behind.
Agent Bellamy, while bleeding out profusely, was carried out of the room by Dr. Steele, and now this creature looks primed to continue whatever sort of frenzied, flailing rampage it's on.
Uh, I would like to draw my 1911 and take a shot.
It is a 22 under 80.
That's a critical hit.
What's the damage done?
For the 1911, it is a D10.
So it just does max damage.
So seeing this creature, you pull out your gun, you take a shot.
This thing explodes all around.
There's still large chunks of it, but it seems to almost be falling inert at this point.
I will let out the breath that I had been holding, subconsciously, and turn to Abe.
What is going on here?
I just as quickly ask you that. You brought this in here.
Do you think we knew that something like that was inside one of our agents, and we came to you looking for answers?
And I wanted to give you an opportunity for more. I'm sorry that we still have time to get this working.
But we gotta figure things out real quick. What's happening here?
Just stay here a minute. Let me get some guys. They'll clean up.
I would like to go find my agents, please.
Hold on just a second. He moves over to the door and opens it up.
Dr. Steele, you're in the hallway.
A couple of armed guards are coming down towards you. Agent Bellamy is in your hands, no longer conscious.
We need a medical facility. Do you have a medical facility in here? She's bleeding out.
Just hold still. Get down.
I lay her down, set her up against the wall.
One of the armed men comes running up, stops, and starts picking Bellamy up.
The other keeps going past you, making a move for the door that is just starting to open.
The one holding Bellamy starts taking her back down the hall.
The other way?
Yeah, the other way, away from where you were just at.
Another person comes running down in more of a lab coat look.
He stops and kind of passes Bellamy off to this person, who starts running off.
The armed guard turns around and starts shuffling you back towards the room you were at.
Please, I might be able to help her.
We have plenty of doctors right now. We need you guys here until we can guarantee everything's safe.
We'll understand the proper procedures at the moment.
Very well. I head back towards the meeting room.
So the two guards kind of make their way in with the doctor Steele back into their room, where Corporal Adams and Abe is.
Abe's kind of pacing about, looking pretty stressed.
He gets on the phone that's on the wall.
And he's like, "Yeah, I need a clean up crew down here now. Hasmats, please."
So what happened? When did this happen? What's going on?
Any of you, either of you know when this could have happened to her? Where'd this come from?
Well, she went missing yesterday.
Yesterday. Okay.
We went looking for her. Couldn't find her. Then she showed up in town.
It was this morning.
Yeah, it was this morning.
Wandering into town from the woods, without a scrap of clothing on, and you know how cold it was.
And she was burning up.
Okay.
Otherwise seemed normal, maybe a little, a little off, but
nothing that would indicate something like this.
Your time investigating this up there, did you see anyone else with similar symptoms?
There have been some reports. I haven't really been able to check if anyone else was burning up.
I don't know if Miss Bonson said she was feeling warm. I know she was very hungry.
I don't remember her saying...
There have been four other victims that have had similar things seem to be bursting out from them.
Although we haven't witnessed anything like this, first hand.
So this could be that gray man then.
That's what the mother was shouting this morning.
I know what the symptoms are like. Do you know if there's only one of these things?
Or are there multiple? Is this the thing?
Considering that Agent Bellamy had only just returned to town,
the morning that the boy in town whose mother had exclaimed that the gray man came out of him,
she would have already been affected. So it's safe to assume there's more than one.
Okay, okay.
He starts pacing and thinking for a minute.
And then the door bursts open.
Two guys, white hazmat suits come in. They're holding a clear container, like suitcase-sized container.
And they set it down and they both kind of start collecting the remains of this thing and begin putting it in.
And Abe kind of is like, "All right, we need to get you both to the infirmary and checked out to make sure both of you are okay."
It showed symptoms like that in her and showed different symptoms in other people.
For all we know, you guys have it and maybe aren't showing symptoms or have different symptoms that you're perhaps not disclosing.
I would imagine you both are smart enough to disclose anything that's going wrong.
I slip my hand into my pocket.
All right, follow us. We're going to take you in.
And the hazmat guys finish collecting and it kind of seals with a scath.
And then they pick it up and they start going and they're following kind of like right behind you guys.
I kind of glance over at Dr. Steele, like, "We doing this?"
"Where else are we going to go?"
Fair point.
And you guys get to the first kind of T-intersection.
And Abe's like, "All right, you guys follow the guards down that way. I got to go this way. I got some stuff I have to take care of now."
"Will you find us again before you return to town?"
"Yeah. Assuming everything goes quote unquote smoothly, yes, I should have time to find you guys again.
If not, I'll get you guys back in town.
But for now, just go with these guys. They'll make sure you're all good and safe.
And then they'll take you guys out and you guys will be just fine."
"We've trusted you this far down here, Abe. We just want to figure things out as well."
"We got to do what we got to do to make sure everyone's safe."
And then he turns off and starts heading down the hall.
Then he does a quick turnaround and starts fast walking down the hall, and the guards look at you guys.
"Come on, let's go."
"I'll follow, semi-reluctantly."
"I'll follow as well."
"Cain in hand, more casual walking."
Another sort of hazmat suited guy who looks more similar, like he's wearing a surgeon's garb,
but with like kind of a hazmat coat on, kind of comes and meets you guys.
"Ah, hello. It's nice to meet you."
"Hello?"
"We are just going to take you down here, and we'll get you all checked out."
"What's your name, doc?"
"Vagner."
His voice could just be the hood, it sounds a little more like mechanical,
like he's speaking through a microphone or something, kind of akin to that.
"Yes. They filled me in briefly, but we should be able to check you out quickly."
He starts walking you guys down through one of the doorways.
Corporal Adams, as you're walking down these halls, you're getting deeper in.
These halls are starting to change a little.
They're not as like white and sterile as that area.
It feels maybe like it's a newer section, like they're still expanding.
But with some of the way it's decorated, some of the rooms you're seeing off to the side,
they're starting to remind you a lot of old Nazi bases that you went in a lot
that were involved with these occult activities.
You guys walk past one of those large fungus farm kind of rooms,
where they've got all those in.
Corporal Adams, with your alertness score, you see when you're looking at the container
holding this amorphous thing, when it's walking by, it starts reaching out a little bit
the first time it started to move towards the fungus, and one of them starts flashing
a couple different colors.
And then as the thing gets further away, it kind of stops.
I know this is probably happening pretty fast, but can I tap Dr. Steel on the shoulder
and point to what's happening without alerting the doctor?
I think that's fine, that's easy enough.
You also notice, actually can I get a roll from you, Corporal? For alert.
Alertness.
26 under 70.
You also notice one of the scientists in the room with the fungus,
when he's walking past some of it, the fungus reacts in the same way to him
as it does to that thing.
Interesting, and in my limited experience with the fungus I'd never seen it do that before, had I?
No, not flashing in those colors.
I've never seen the fungus do lights like that before, that's interesting.
I haven't seen that either.
Did Bellamy mention it responding to something like that with the craft?
She said she did mention that they were glowing that night with the borealis.
Hard to say if it was the same pattern.
I can try a botany roll to see the way the plant is reacting, if I can tell if it is still completely organic
or is it something extra to it that's not organic, I guess.
Yeah, roll botany.
That's a nope.
Yeah, it was brief that you got to look at it, and you're not really too sure how exactly that goes about.
Now you guys are turning down another haul.
I'll speak up so that the doctor can hear me.
Has there been any update on Agent Bellamy's condition?
Well, I'm sure she's being looked at as we speak.
I'll just kind of nod.
She did not look like she was in very good condition.
She certainly was in a fragile state there.
It's a good time for the new breakthroughs in technology that we will see, but can happen here.
Dr. Wagner, do you serve as only medical staff here or do you also help run experiments?
I do all sorts of things.
I am a medical doctor by trade, or I was.
Then I got into more testing and research and development.
Now I lead several projects.
It's been good since I've come here.
Certainly curious to know what kind of projects you're leading.
There are all sorts, mostly medical.
I like the medical ones.
Occasionally we do weapons testing, but those are very dangerous.
We do not always understand all those weapons we have to test with.
You're developing weapons here?
Well, we don't do much developing of new weaponry.
We just do testing of weaponry we find.
Here we are mostly a medical facility.
I only stand here before you because of such trials.
I would not be here otherwise.
Things work out for many people in very many different ways.
I trust you both are feeling well? Physically, as that is.
A little shaken, but yeah.
Yes, shaken, concerned. Fork and Patriot.
I look over to Corporal Hans Kangem.
They're like, "I'm not trusting Dr. Wagner."
"I will return that gaze exactly."
But keep following.
You both have some experience with these creatures.
Do you know of any signs we could make for easy testing?
I certainly have plans for more involved testing, but, you know.
Things we've seen that have caused similar injuries.
There have been headaches, a ravenous appetite.
[SIGH]
Incisions.
There's always incisions on the body, or we could see.
Very minute.
Elevated body temperature.
That was, yeah, that's a new one that we're aware of.
The only ones we're really aware of for this has been Bunsen, the young boy, and Bellamy.
The other two we weren't here for, so we can only see the aftermath.
Their bodies are a unique state as well, but.
It's assuming that these things are the same, and we're not dealing with two separate...
Grey men?
Well, we don't know for a fact that the Grey men are involved in the deaths that had transpired before we arrived.
Are these Grey men what you refer to as these small little amorphous things?
That's the only hunch we have so far.
The young boy's had seen it previously, and was said he was frightened by it,
whereas his mother stated that the thing came out, the Grey man had come out of him.
But it's assuming that what happened to him, what happened to Agent Bellamy, are one and the same.
I guess we only saw the aftermath of what happened to the boy, which was his wounds.
I didn't have much time to examine him for any other symptoms he had, I was only aware that he seemed to exhibit a headache.
And for what I am aware of, these things can remain dormant for a while.
Hmm, like perfect little sleeper cells.
Surprised the Russians are not involved, they like to do things like this.
But Himmler would have been very appreciative of things like this.
Corporal Adams will stop in his tracks whenever he says the name Himmler.
Is everything alright? The door is right here.
He hits a button and the door opens up. It's just like a nice, patient waiting room.
Corporal Adams, the colour drains from his face, and he's just...
if looks could kill, he's staring daggers at Dr. Wagner.
Corporal? Is everything alright?
You worked with Himmler?
Oh, for a while, yes. He liked my work, so I worked with him for a bit, and then the war was over.
Well, this lovely government of yours hired me and its fellows to work for them, you know.
So you're an ex-patriot.
I suppose so. I am a man of science, and I go back and do the most work, the most advancement in my field.
And a place like this, well, I do not know of a better place with more advanced science to work with, you know?
Do you understand? I share no love or sympathy for people like Himmler, but I appreciated what he allowed me to do.
I'm going to take a few steps forward, and I am going to punch him in the face.
You hit him on the head, right in the face, and it feels like you just punched, like, a steel wall, and he just kind of staggers back.
He's like, "Oh, my goodness. Oh, my goodness." And, like, his hood's ripped, and you can see, like, some metal through the hood.
"Oh, my God. That was very rude of you, sir."
It takes off his hood, because it's all ripped in his way, and, like, catty corner, and it's this metal shoulder pad rim that goes up into a, like, bulletproof glass sort of looking like cylinder with a brain floating inside of it.
Oh, my gosh.
Corporal Adams was going to have say something, and then he just freezes when he sees the true face of this man.
Well, both of you roll sanity, Jankx.
Yeah.
Yes.
20 under 62.
Boy, I hope I roll as good as you. I did not roll as good as you. That's 62 over 24.
You lose one. No one. How do you lose three?
I'm just going to take it.
How do you both mentally react to seeing this?
Dr. Seale just kind of, "Good Lord, you're a talking head."
Corporal Adams, like I said, froze for a moment when he saw the true form of this Dr. Wagner, and once he gets a full view and can comprehend what he's seeing, he's going in for another punch.
Or, actually, better yet, instead of just going in for another punch, I'll draw my gun and point it at him. I won't shoot immediately.
So you draw your gun on this floating brain doctor, and the guards both ready their weapons as well.
It'll take a moment, but eventually I'll flip my gun up and lower it.
My my, you are a very feisty one. Let me guess. You are a corporal, after all. I'm sure you've seen many horrors in Hitler's bases.
I apologize for what you might have seen, but please don't lump me in with those savages, if you will.
I am a man of the future, after all. As he said, a talking head, but more like a brain. I don't have much of a head anymore.
Yes. Was this before or after?
After that?
Your recruitment?
Your Majestic? Well, my recruitment was more or less voluntary. In surveil, I feel like I owe them a great debt. They recovered my body and they recovered my brain.
And they have found this device and decided to give it a test. Lo and behold, it's exactly what a brain needs to survive on its own. And so I have lived. And so I am here.
It's certainly, uh...
Please, put your guns down, he motions to the guards. It will be all right.
Old habits die hard.
Oh, I can imagine you're not the first one to be shocked at, uh, your government's use of, uh, ex-enemies, if you will. But keep us assured, you are in the military.
We are allies now. I am also in the government. We are friends now. You and I, the same team, same side.
Corporal Adams will nod slightly, but not say anything.
Are we ready to step inside the Infirmary?
You first.
Oh yes, after me.
And he starts kind of walking forward.
Is there, do we see other people in the room ahead of us?
No. There is like a little bit of a blood trail heading into the back room. That's very fresh.
Okay. Looks like this might be where they took her.
I'm gonna bend down, touch the blood, kinda look at it, as inconspicuously as possible, rub it on the sigil on my hand to try and cover it up.
Interesting.
I will follow, stepping into the threshold of the room. I guess finding a place to sit down for, take a load off I guess.
I'll do that too. I'm not happy about it, but I don't see what choice that I have, so.
So, you two were here to be recruited, perhaps? To hear about what we do here?
We were here to hear a pitch.
Yes.
I'm sorry. It went so badly for you.
Yes. Colonel Trenton was giving us a spiel, saying how much he, what goes on here. Interested in what we know and our own services, but yes, things certainly went south.
Yes, very unfortunate. I very much like the Colonel. He was a very good man.
I'm looking around this room, is this kinda similar where it's like, it's not pristine white, it's kinda looking like older?
It looks a little more sanitized than the rest of it, but it's not like a finished area, fully.
Okay.
I shouldn't say like a finished area, like a redone area. It looks like everything's finished, but they've been reworking it to make it look different.
Any odd medical books or like posters on the wall, I guess, like.
Just memorabilia.
Yeah. His medical degree.
And this is more like a patient waiting room, so there's not a lot in here. There is up on the top of one of the walls, like an iron cross.
So who would like to go first, or should I just take you both in? We all need to get the testing underway. Make sure you are both safe so we can send you on your way. Yeah?
I'll go first.
Ah, wunderbar.
I feel I think I should come along as well. The incisions are very particular. Wouldn't want to make a stake in four bullet wounds.
Yes, you've seen these incisions, yes?
Yes.
wunderbar. Come with me into the back room.
And you both head into the back room. Kind of what you would expect from an operation room? There is set in like a kind of like a slab at a morgue. Over to the side you do see Bellamy's body.
So, um.
She didn't make it.
Oh, no it doesn't look like she did. That's not all too surprising. She was pretty torn up inside, and her back being open like that. Well, that might have helped more than it hindered, to be honest.
I need a second.
Of course, of course.
He goes over and starts messing with some tools.
I'm going to go stand by Dr. Steele. I am going to take a moment to mourn Agent Bellamy, who, even though we've had known each other for very long, she was still my ally.
Then I'm going to lean over to Dr. Steele and whisper in his ear.
If you find any of those incisions on me, lie to him.
Okay. Um, yeah standing over there taking a moment to mourn Bellamy as well. Looks as damaged as it was. Last I saw it, like, nothing new.
Oh no, nothing new at all.
Did she have on like any rings or anything?
Yeah, yeah, I think she would have had a ring on her left ring finger.
I will take her hand and take the ring off, set it back down.
I will show Corbondol, I'm not going to hide that from him.
I nod.
Maybe we can give someone some closure.
Yeah.
Put it in my inner breast pocket. Where, uh, Dr. Wagner, where do you want to examine us?
Just right here on the table.
It's like an operating table.
Just take a seat and we will look, the two of us together, Dr. Steele, we can look over this man and see if he's got any incisions first.
And then we can poke him proud, see if something moves around inside of him.
And then, uh, I don't know, just testing that. Have you been exposed to any um, radiation recently?
We were investigating the mushrooms.
Any single essence thoughs or just the mushrooms? Those should be fine.
Just, just the mushrooms as far as I know.
Okay, okay.
That's probably, would have had such exposure to anything else here.
I see, I see. Well, let's come over, shall we?
Let's get this over with.
If it works for the inspection, I do want to just look to see if it's really on your arm, something like that. If not, I'd ask you to take off your shirt to see if there's anything on there.
I'll comply, especially with Dr. Steele. Anything that Dr. Wagner asked me to do, I'll take a second out of small protest.
Okay, hmm. I suppose just my eyes are not as good as they used to be.
Yes, it'd be a little bit difficult without showing Dr. Wagner, do I see where there would have been an incision on items from this?
Looking over his torso on his back to the right, kind of behind his ribs. You see a small incision, kind of like the ones you saw on Bellamy.
Back, right, towards ribs, okay.
No, just like old war wounds. He would probably be pretty scarred up. Yeah.
I don't know if that's it. Let's see.
I'm now knowing where that's at, I'm just kind of playing, trying to buy time, I guess. I'm not sure if Abe is going to come looking for us or not.
At this point, over like loudspeakers, there's a little chime.
Dr. Wagner, I need you up here.
Oh, well. Dr. Steele, I trust you both know how to examine each other, perhaps for this.
The guards will stay here, and they'll keep watch, and one of my assistants will help. I'll be back shortly.
Very well.
Did we recognize the voice over the intercom, or was that-
It was Abe.
It was Abe.
It sounded like Abe, I guess.
That's, yeah. That's what I wanted to know.
Okay.
And as he leaves, one of the assistants in a similar hazmat garb comes in, looking a little nervous.
I'm not going to say anything, but for you, since I've noticed, I'm going to like place my finger there and apply more pressure than I was normally.
I get the hint, yes.
The assistant reaches around his back and starts pulling out a Geiger counter, and he walks over to Bellamy's body, and it starts going off pretty strongly.
He's like kind of shaky, nervous.
You all right over there?
Well, I'm fine, I'm fine, yes. Ya, ya, just fine. Um, let's see, huh.
And he kind of starts going over to the doctor with it.
You seem a bit nervous.
And it doesn't go off too much on you.
Too much, but yeah.
Okay. Um, don't worry about me. I know exactly what I'm doing here, Dr. Steel.
Well, I trust your shaking hand to hold that, but-
It's normally not that shaky, but-
I certainly wouldn't trust you with a blade.
I wouldn't either.
Um, he nervously kind of almost says something and stops. He's got a hood so you can't really see his face.
Does his voice sound mechanical like Dr. Wagner's?
It does not.
Okay.
But it sounds muffled through this, it's a little hard to register.
He starts taking it over corporal, and it starts going off a little bit, and he kind of flicks it.
You corporals you're watching notice it actually goes off, but he's still acting like it's on.
And then he pulls it back, and he's like, "You do not find no radiation problems."
That's good to hear.
And he puts it back on his back.
What was so important that Dr. Wagner needed to be called away?
I don't know.
What do you think of working with him here?
He turns around to look at the guards that are kind of talking to each other a minute.
I don't know.
He leans into Dr. Steele.
I'm just a radiologist, Doctor. I'm not supposed to be here.
Johan.
Oh, how'd you get down here?
A little bit of espionage.
[Laughter]
I have a very important question for you.
Oh yeah?
Why did you turn off the Geiger counter when you put it over me?
You're very radioactive.
Oh.
It's like I thought these things were radioactive, perhaps even feeding off of the mushrooms, the fungus.
Have you noticed anything like that in your experience?
Some of the people down here seem to have a reaction, and then the thing, the gray blob thing,
the gray man, seem to have a response with the mushrooms.
Also some medical, some personnel here seem to have a response to them as well.
Is that like, like there's more of these things in the people, or is it just like, they're just radioactive in that response?
They seem to not know what this was here. His Abe didn't.
It seemed as a surprise as we were, well maybe it was just a surprise about whose hands it ended up in.
Ah, you know we're pretty close to an exit.
Really?
Yeah. How do you two feel about all of this stuff?
As much knowledge as they have, I feel that it's their hands that are the most dangerous, perhaps.
I agree.
Good, you might like us.
He turns over and looks at the guards, they're still chatting.
Okay.
He pulls out his Geiger counter again.
Just give me one second.
He's just staring at the two guards like he's trying to formulate something.
I'm going to put my shirt back on.
Yes, yeah, probably should.
I will, I'm not sure what, I am curious if there's anything here that would be like information we would want to take with us in this infirmary.
I don't know if they have anything like that.
We could search for it real quick, inconspicuously.
Do they have a file cabinet in here?
It doesn't look like there's a lot kept in here. There are a lot of tools, there's like some bone saws, some actual saws, some like very large needles and things like that.
So we're supposed to fight past the guards, how far is it to the exit?
Where do we end up at?
You know, simple things, like he's trying not to say things he doesn't know what to say.
And Corporal Adams, you look at his bilingual it looks like he is about to just lunge out with the Geiger counter.
I'm going to put my hand on his shoulder.
Put my finger to my lips to signal to remain quiet.
I'm going to point, is there two guards? Yeah. Okay.
I'll go for the one on the right, you go for the one on the left. I'm going to use the butt of my gun.
Come from behind and try to give him a concussion or something.
It's quite a lot of can move up to the guy on the left and I rolled.
You guys can both make a move before they do anything.
I'm going to use melee weapons to use the butt of my gun.
Before you guys make these rolls, we give you both a plus 10% on what you're doing because they are unaware.
With the plus 10%, that's 73 under 80.
94. Oh, does not help.
My unarmed combat became 70 with that plus 10. I was going to try to like grapple and pull him back into the room.
Yeah, knock him out. What does base melee stuff?
Unarmed combat base is 40. Melee is 30. Melee weapons is 30.
Oh, then Johan succeeded. So why don't you describe what you're doing?
I creep up behind him and as smooth a motion as I can just wail on the back of his head with the butt of my gun to try and knock him out.
And then catch him and lower him so the fall of his body doesn't make a sound if I'm successful.
As you do that, the other guy kind of jolts a bit and the doctor throws his punch and the dude kind of sidesteps it.
But then the side of his head gets spluttered by a Geiger counter as Johan just whacks him and then just keeps whacking.
Very nervously. And then he stops.
Johan, he's out.
Okay, good job. So much adrenaline. So we should go now. You should come with me.
What kind of weapons are the guards? Do the guards have?
One of them has a shotgun. One of them just has a automatic rifle.
I will take one and hand. I will take the automatic rifle and I will give the shotgun to Dr. Steel. We need to go right now.
Yes, follow me then. Let's go. Johan leads you under the hallway and looks down the way you guys did not come from.
Just this way? They haven't finished sealing this part off. That's how I got in here. Follow me.
But be very careful. There are still people who patrol the area so don't be suspicious.
Act natural.
I'm following him. I'm trying to follow him like he's the assistant taking us somewhere where we're needed. He already needs us.
So you guys continue heading down. Looking off to the left are some more of those windows.
And through it you can see what is probably that same airplane hangar that Bellamy saw before but all the way over here as well.
It extends fairly far so you guys can actually see a couple of old German planes.
But Johan, when you guys go up to the tee instead of turning in that direction, Johan turns to the right.
So you guys continue down. It's getting darker. The lights aren't working as well down this direction.
But you can see there's a big steel bolted, big doors with the wheel handles and there's a guard hanging out sitting on a chair by it.
Does it look like he's noticed us?
No, it's fairly dark so he might not have noticed you right away with where you guys are at. You guys are still kind of a caddy corner at a turn.
I will go up to him and speak to him.
And Vegas sings out.
Was he here when you came in?
No, I don't think so. I didn't see him.
A friend of mine said it was good to go in. So I went in.
Stay back here. Wait for your signal.
Yeah, alright, I got this. I got this.
So what I'm going to do is I'm going to stick to the shadows. But I am going to level that rifle that I picked up at the guard in case whatever Johan's about to do doesn't work.
Johan runs up to the guy and the guy's like, what are you doing here?
I'm just trying to use the restroom.
Then you took the wrong turn.
Well, I feel so awkward using the restroom. He asked what I would use outside instead.
You know, no, I don't understand. You need to.
Well, you know. And then he just sort of like like he's trying to be really deceptive, very obviously fakes a fall like he slips.
Oh no.
The guard gets stands up from his chair and looks down at him.
Like, what are you doing here? Who are you?
And he starts making a reach for his walkie.
Is the guards back turn to us at this point?
His side is turned to you.
Okay, how and how far away is he from us?
20 feet.
Could I theoretically close that gap before he's able to call for help or call on his walkie?
Yeah, presuming when he like notices you, he starts focusing on you over focusing on the walkie call.
Because I don't really want to shoot in here because that will alerts people.
So I think I think that's our play.
So I'm instead of taking that shot that I'd lined up, I'm going to just bum rush him.
All right. Roll like check real quick.
Whoa, 73 as you start rushing him, he does look over and see you sees you and he pulls his walkie talkie out of like its little sleeve.
But Johan kind of flails and knocks the radio out of his hand for a second.
And then you're you close the distance.
And I'm just going to try to incapacitate him.
I'm going to punch him in the face and then try to get him in a choke hold.
He passes out slowly lower into the ground.
Oh, that's went pretty bad.
I think I hurt my back.
Some good acting.
Oh, thank you. I've been working on it.
Let's get out of here before guard change happens again.
Of course. Yes.
And he opens up the door, spins the wheel.
I pick up and like look Corbin's like a walkie.
Take it. Yes.
I'll be careful out here by the way.
Watch your step.
And he opens the door and a rush of cold wind just comes fighting through.
And you guys see just a sheer like 200 foot drop into like a cliff edge at water.
We just have to shimmy along here.
Along the cliff and we will get to safety.
Yeah.
Easy stuff.
Simple enough.
Doctor, I see you have a cane and a limp.
You think you'll be OK?
I'll be fine.
I can keep my balance.
OK. All right.
I'll just follow me Zen.
And he steps out, takes off his hazmat clothing and just throws it off the cliff.
He's like sweating.
He's hot in those.
How do people wear those all day?
Come with me.
And he just like shimmies up against the wall.
And just starts going.
I'll let Dr. Steel go next and then I'll take up the rear.
I will follow suit.
I'll close the door behind you.
I do so.
As you guys are shimmying along, Johan starts kind of explaining.
We have been tracking down this group for a while now.
After some people left and we heard rumors of some things happening,
I was approached by some people to help look into a situation here.
Who's we?
There's a couple friends of mine with me in the cabin.
I'm just freelancers, I suppose you could say.
I don't think we are.
I don't think they are affiliated with any government like these people are.
To tell you the truth, I'm not sure these people are affiliated with our government.
They are, they are.
Certainly a lot of knowledge has been gleaned from this, from these people.
It's certainly troubling to see what they continue to do with resources they've been given.
So you're part of a more freelance group, you could say.
Came in there looking for us?
Yeah, I'd seen you all go off with Mr. Rogers, and I was worried.
You seemed like nice folks.
Well, it's certainly appreciated.
We weren't sure how we were going to get out of there, given how far out of town we are and how deep they took us.
Are you and your friends the same group that came in during a funeral in your truck?
Or are you just one and you're affiliated with others?
Yeah, we are all together in this.
One of them, Timothy, he had some sort of knowledge about recruiting expatriates.
Nazi sympathizers and such, and he wanted to take a look at what was happening up here, and so he recruited some people to help.
I could introduce you to him if you'd like.
Certainly could have another introduction for today.
Hopefully the sheriff can wait whatever he's found himself in.
If they understand that you've escaped, well, if they take it as an escape, they might go looking for you at town.
It might be safer to go there first.
But we are not far from here, my people. We could swing by quickly.
Certainly. I don't think I'd want to walk all the way to town on foot unless we've already gone further.
That's that. We have a car at our place.
Yes.
So you all, excuse me, to clearing now.
It's no longer unsafe.
You guys are now trekking into the woods.
As you guys have walked for maybe 20 minutes or so, Johann's like, "We should be getting close now."
Corporal, you kind of notice off to the side, a little bit of a clearing, and you notice the snow kind of dips in like a circular fashion.
Like I saw back at the lab.
Yes.
Johann, I don't point to the indention.
Y'all?
Has that always been there?
That?
That attention in the snow? Or is that something you've noticed before?
No, I haven't noticed that before. It's probably just from the storm.
It's not. I've seen something like it before, back at Ms. Bunsen's lab.
I didn't have a good feeling about it then, but I couldn't follow up on it. I think it's connected.
At this point, it had been a reprieve in the weather from when you guys got to this place, but the rain and storm begins to move through again now.
Huh.
I don't know what. It's just a bad feeling.
Okay, we have to... maybe it has something to do with the radiation pockets. On occasion, there's spots of higher radiation?
Perhaps something like that we have seen. Maybe some cross-referencing would help?
Do you still have that Geiger counter with you?
Oh, yeah. Right here. You guys also both have Geiger counters.
Could be worth at least a first check.
I would. It probably shouldn't be me because I think I'm going to give off a false reading.
That's true. You stay back.
Be careful.
Have your gun ready.
I will start to go in towards clearing. Rain's coming down. Is rain going down into the pit as well? Does it look like the weather's acting weird around this too?
No, the weather's acting normal. So the rain's not super heavy yet, but it's starting to pick up.
I'll click on the Mike Geiger counter.
As you do that, and he's getting ready, it kind of shorts out.
Oh, you need to get away from that thing.
I briskly move back.
Well, mine's not good anymore.
And he turns his on. And yeah, the radiation's a little higher there.
Where did you get that? It's not a very good one.
Standard issue, I guess.
I'll turn mine on and kind of wave it.
Yours also breaks when you turn it on.
Weird.
If I can disassemble it and see if there's any other parts in it that look out of place.
Yeah, as you disassemble it, you're not as familiar with what it should look like.
But Johan's looking at it and he's like, is that why it's not right? There's a cross here.
We got these from Delta Green, right?
Yeah.
Someone tampered with these. They did work before.
They've obviously been tampered with.
It's possible that they're only just now breaking.
They could have been tampered with the whole time. I don't know.
I remember checking our room before. Doesn't seem to have an issue then.
It's possible we've been getting false readings this whole time.
Yes, yeah.
You got those from Delta Green? What is Delta Green?
Whoops.
What I should have said was it's a military surplus store.
Oh, well that would explain the faulty equipment.
Military surplus. That's funny.
Delta Green. I'll have to look it up sometime.
It should.
It should. Maybe we can get this fixed. How much further?
Just a couple of minutes actually. We should be able to see it just over this ridge.
As you guys come stepping over this ridge and Johan is looking happy to be back,
you guys see in front of you just this large raging fire.
In the distance you can see what looks like it used to be a log cabin at the center of this as it's spreading and spreading.
And you can see some fungus around again. The fire just going over it, not even harming it at all.
It's a lightning flash.
We fade away.
[Music]
Thank you for listening to the Records of the Unknown Operation Latency.
Records of the Unknown is an Atomic Broadcasting Production.
Delta Green is copyright of Arc Dreams Publishing.
Operation Latency is not published or endorsed by Arc Dreams Publishing and is an original module created and run by Samuel Sarver.
Our players are Nolan as Dr. Sylvester Steele and Harrell as Corporal Alexander Adams.
Music in the show is from Monument Studios as well as various artists.
If you enjoy the show, be sure to subscribe or follow the Atomic Broadcasting Network on your favorite listening platform.
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Don't forget to like, comment, and tell a friend. And as always, have an Atomic Time.
[Music]
Why did you turn off the Geiger counter when you put it over me?
You're very radioactive.
Oh.
[Laughter]
I'll take a couple steps back.
[Laughter]
You can't run away from yourself, Corporal!
I was trying to keep you safe.
[Laughter]
(laughing)
