Elsworth Memo - Episode 7

TYPE: Red File - Classified
FROM: Dr. Elsworth T. Lloyd
TO: Jean Qualis, CED
SUBJECT: Raid on Aztecs and Investigation of Mysterious Deaths in San Medino

On December 29, 2501 I was teamed up with Jason and Stephanie Fox, Billy Eagleclaw, and the strangely quiet Jared Carson and sent by skycar to New Orleans. Once there we were taken directly to the TNS Houston, one of the Texas Navy's new orbital stealth submarines. Kepler Reece, of the ROPCIA, had flown in from Rayburn to accompany us to our drop point. We were briefed on the way.

Our mission was to act as an insertion team and take out certain security and alarm devices at an Aztec forward listening post. AFSAF would perform the actual raid on the AEF troops camped nearby, but it was our job to take out the computer systems inside the listening post building. After much thought and planning, it was agreed that an undercover approach, posing as a high-ranking AEF inspection team, would be the most effective. Agent Eagleclaw, Agent Carson, and myself would approach the target building in AEF uniforms, and for tactical support, the Fox siblings would approach covertly fully armed and carrying explosives.

The fabricated uniforms and Agent Eagleclaw's ability to speak Spanish got us past
security cameras and automated security devices in the jungle surrounding our target. Our approach helped to mask the approach of our tactical support. While we gained entry through trickery, the Fox siblings acquired control of the roof of our target. A late night inspection ruse allowed us access to the security/computer bunker without contact with the more intelligent, higher-ranking officers. As is the necessity of war, all obstacles to our objective were eliminated and Agent Carson was able to disable the listening post, including all security functions.

The AFSAF took over from there, handily destroying the nearby AEF troop camp. I am sure I have made it clear to you in the past, and I feel obligated to bring the topic of "wet" missions up again with you. As a doctor and a law enforcement investigator, I do not feel comfortable with the amount of death and destruction involved in the mission you assigned to me. You know that I favor the use of stutter technology when possible, and that missions where the death of my targets is not only necessary, but practically ordered is abhorrent. In this case I understand that this initial effort was aimed at "buying" the cooperation of the AFS in gaining access to San Medino...but I still don't have to like it.

Agent Carson acquired sensitive information from the AEF computer system, but it will be necessary to refer to his report for details in this matter.

We made the long hard hike from the listening post to San Medino as quickly as possible, hoping to avoid the Aztec reaction to our initial raid. Upon our arrival in that cursed little town, we found the homes to be empty and for the most part undisturbed. Homes with their doors left open had been traversed and soiled by animals and the like, but there was no sign of human struggle or death in the homes themselves. I was hoping to find a crime scene or the scene of a natural death. Many clues can be found outside of a body at such a scene, that the body itself would not yield. Our luck in this endeavor was lacking, and we proceeded to investigate a second point of interest.

On the satellite images of San Medino a disk shaped disturbance of soil was visible.
Initially I was hoping it would be the entrance to an underground power-generating facility, or a research laboratory. But instead we found a mass grave of massive proportions. We paused for quite some time, contemplating the task which lay before us. Agent Stephanie Fox, power-armored and environmentally protected, did the digging. I was able to field-autopsy some 10 different bodies. Ranging in apparent age from 4 years old to 87 years old, all of these Aztec civilians had died of the same cause...massive cerebral hemorrhages of the left frontal lobe of the brain. I will leave the technical aspects to my medical report (see attached), but suffice it to say that I was unable to identify any chemical, biological, viral, or other physical cause for such a sudden and wide-spread simultaneous ceasing of life functions among the members of a community.

I brought back as many samples as I could carry for further testing by KBI and ROPCIA doctors and labtechs. I made sure I had dermal, skeletal, hair and teeth, organ, and muscular samples, and I will expect to receive notice if my findings are determined to be incorrect.

We were notified over our comms that Agent Eagleclaw had observed what appeared to be two winged-Sesheyans (please reference Void Corp files) in the area of San Medino. We met in an abandoned home in order to plan an approach on these new players in our mission. Suddenly we were attacked and under siege by the very bodies I had just finished autopsying, as well as additional bodies that we assume dug themselves up. They acted as one would suppose an animated dead body would act - for without dependence on functioning living systems, "death" could only be delivered by an almost complete destruction of the structural frame of the bodies. In other words, the only way to cease their undead attack was to destroy there capacity for locomotion. Physical integrity had to be eliminated. Our team fought hard, using plasma and incendiary grenades, as well as mass, charge, and flechette technology to blow those hell-spawn back into their early graves. You cannot imagine the horror.

After the bodies had been dispatched, and we had bound our wounds, we returned to the burial pit. Military style bootprints were located in the soft earth around the mass grave. I was still together enough to manage a use of my psi-talent, so I focused on the earth of that bootprint asking it to show me its secrets. I observed a thin dark haired man, about 5'9" or 5'10" wearing what was clearly the uniform of an Aztec soldier. The bootprints led us to a trial, and we began following it.

We eventually came upon what appeared to be an ancient stone totem pole, covered with cryptic pictographs. We disentangled it from the jungle vines that were embracing it, and took multiple vids of the worn pictographs. We were careful to use lighting to generate shadows within the markings. At some point it hit us...this was an ancient object on a planet which has been host to mankind for only a brief passage of time. How did it get here? Who brought it here? What purpose does it serve? It is for these reasons that we made sure that we brought back the best possible images of it for KBI and ROPCIA experts to examine.

I decided that perhaps focusing my talents on the stone might turn up some answers. The stone did not welcome my probe, and I was quite shaken when I was psionically slapped to the ground. My head ached, and I knew at that moment that I had come face to face with something very powerful and ancient. We placed a GPS beacon near the totem, and called for retrieval. We knew that the longer we stayed in the Aztec jungle, the better the chances that the AEF would find us.

Once back on the TNS Houston, we were debriefed by Kepler Reece. We told him all of the details of our mission, and he seemed very upset. He turned somewhat pale and rushed from the room, mumbling to himself something about, "This is very bad...very very bad." A short while later we felt the Houston shudder, and we knew that a missile had been fired. We had no doubt that the target of that launch was none other than the ancient totem.

Please let us know the results of the laboratory tests on the San Medino samples, and any findings that are made from our vids of the ancient totem. There is one more matter I will talk to you about in-person only. Until I have the pleasure of meeting with your again, this report is...

...Respectfully Submitted, Dr. Elsworth T. Lloyd

GM: Michael Cross (e-mail)