Per 
Recovered Audio Log- Questioning of Sergeant Major Zachary Matthews (Retired)
Date of Recovery: 12-2-2020 - Upon Request by O5 Council Member
Date of Initial Recording: 5-14-2009
It was supposed to be just a normal day. The barracks of Site 19 was nice and cozy and relatively safe given the directing of Dr. Clef. Unlike the rest of the week, Site 19 had no memetic agents, no dangerous cognitohazards, no death (At least not at that time), nobody was freezing their balls or pussys off, and there were no abandoned ghost towns! As you may or may not know; I have no fucking idea who you are, I was apart of the old Lambda 3, before it was decommissioned and forgotten… before I retired. I was only a damn Master Sergeant at the time, the fifth in line of command, Commander Mokes was my damn CO, and he didn't tell me shit about that damn shithole of an operation other than we'd be working with the "City Slickers" and a small detachment of "See No Evil". We had taken a helicopter to the north-west end of Russia, just a bunch of fucking snow, and mountains, and trees, and more damn snow. In college my minor was geography and those damn mountains I didn't recognize, there were no records of a mountain range of that caliber, of that size! To fucking be there! We had laid a FOB in a small clearing, it was only of a couple of tents on a lot of snow. At the time, it was only us; 6 Lambda-3 including me, the 6 members of City Slickers, and 3 of See No Evil. Then there was a helicopter… Black with a red… fist on the cabin door. It landed and 5 soldiers stepped out, 4 males and 1 one female. I recognized one of them, the only one without one of them red fists on their shoulder. It was the MTF Field Correspondent I had worked with him before, he was British, but nobody really knew anything else about him, except he was cold and a literal immortal killing machine, but I do admit I do think his companions know a lot. Anyway, an MTF Field Correspondent is essentially the same thing as a General in an army. Unlike most Generals, they are actually on the field, as the name suggests, and they answer only to one of the members of the O5, the actual Military Correspondent for the council. [Pause followed by a question from Dr. REDACTED] You're a scientist how would I know you knew? But that's what I heard back then anyway. The Correspondent and his squad walked up to the rest of us and the oldest guy walked up to me specifically, looked in his late 50s. "Where's your CO Master Sergeant?" The man asked. "Uh in the command tent… Who are you guys anyway?" I asked the man. "Commander Battelback… Your new boss." He then leaves without another word. I don't remember exactly what happened before the briefing so I guess I'll skip ahead.
I was sitting on the ground, and my ass was freezing off. I was closely monitoring the red fist guys, I was curious about them. The Field Correspondent was already in the Command Tent and had been for a while. The youngest guy; Garcia lit a cigarette. The lighter he held lit up his Mexican face. The female was apparently the Correspondent's little sister, the youngest of 4 siblings (the Correspondent was the eldest), she was reading a book under a nearby tree, must be a bookworm. The lieutenant… THE DAMN LIEUTENANT WAS SLEEPING ON A COUCH! How'd Valern even get the couch there, no less how he was sleeping in the cold without a blanket? That man? That man is extremely resourceful and is overly casual about it! When a couple of the Pi-1 boys asked him about it he just shrugged and said "I dunno, just found it." Then he fell asleep after that! Battelback was standing outside the Command Tent, obviously waiting for the Correspondent to leave. Nobody was talking to them, if they were intimidated or uninterested I didn't know. I just watched. The Field Correspondent finally left the tent with the two Commanders. He walked to the front of the camp. "You all should know me. Even if you don't, it doesn't matter. You will be referring to me as Marshal or sir. We will be marching to an abandoned city about one and a half klicks north down that road. Our objective is in that city, particularly in the center-" Battelback looked worried and interrupted "The city park?" In a calming voice, the Marshal replies "Yes Richard… The park. Alright! Commanders, I want 2 callsigns, Sunray and Nova. 3 of Pi-1 and 3 of Lambda-3. I'll assign the Eta-10 operatives." Then he stopped "I need to ask… Have any of you heard of Alpha-1? The right hand of the O5?" He paused again and pointed to the red fist dudes "That's them. They're the best, and they're like family to me… Anyhow, we will be recovering an old friend of mine, the asset is the old R&D Director; Director Jordan Lawson. He was lost from me in the siege of a classified area, a containment breach. I cannot give you the details of it, but I was the only surviving member of the initial Nine-Tailed-Fox team, so that should give you some idea of what happened. I've been searching for him for the past 5 months, and I believe I have finally found him. I recovered an old encrypted email that was sent to me about 2 months ago in my inbox, and it held only a couple of pictures. A picture of a handwritten letter and it was his. You may be thinking; how do you know? Easy… I have a photographic memory, and that was his handwriting. The letter mentioned some kind of teleportation, and he didn't know where he was for a time. He told me that he was somewhere extremely anomalous and had gathered some maps he found in the building he bunkered in and he was somewhere in northern Russia and one of the pictures was one of those maps. The weird thing about was that city was nowhere to be found on our maps. Finally, he said in the letter he couldn't go outside because of "them". We don't really know what they are, but my resonance drones have seen some very strange happenings in the park before they went offline. Our primary objective is the Director, containing the anomaly is only secondary. I don't care what we stand for, Lawson is more important than containing an anomaly that has 0 chance of being dangerous to the Russian people, but I know what I work for, so I have plans to get rid of the anomaly. The Director should be in an old Park Ranger's station in the direct center of the park. It is dangerous but I wouldn't risk 20 lives if this wasn't important. Lawsons' mind alone is worth 30, and to me, he is worth more. Yes, this mission is personal for me, but I did notice something very important before I lost him in Area 20. He had shown anomalous activity and had told me that he couldn't die. Lawson doesn't lie either." Then he looked towards the two commanders to his left "Commanders, start grouping your squads half and half. Commander Logov you got Sunray, Commander Mokes? You got Nova." Mokes immediately rounded his team together, and I still remember all their names… Leonard, Barry, Uchenko, Rachel, Nick, and Walker… The thing is I don't remember much before we had already neared the city. It seemed out of place, just a city like New York except it's encircled by mountains that's no one's ever heard of. The only thing I remember before we had entered the city was I marched next in Valern, that smug bastard. At some point we had entered the town, of course, the tall gray buildings soon surrounded us as we stalked through the street. As soon as we stepped into the perimeter of the decrepit city, it became foggy and lot less cold, there was ice all over the buildings yet little to no snow on the street. I was still beside Lieutenant Valern who was walking a lot more casually than all of us, except for the Marshal… He walked with his weapons holstered like he expected nothing. His face wasn’t as stern and emotionless as before, it had a hint of sorrow… Almost like he was remembering something fond or depressing, an event stuck in time, and a bit of familiarity crossed his face. He jogged up to the Eta-10 members who ahead of us and whispered something to them. Over the radio, I heard the Williams sultry English accent “No need for goggles boys, the city’s clear of hazards.” After that some of the Lambda-3 boys starting talking, stuff like how would he know and are we going to die. I shut them up quickly. We were nearing the center, inching ever so closer to the park. One of the Eta-10 operators said over the radio that he had seen some movement then one of the red fist guys, I think it was Garcia but I can’t recall, had reported a visual. Then Valern and I saw them, they looked like ghosts… and they had weaponry. Battelback being paranoid the paranoid old man he is, ordered everyone to get into cover. Everyone ran into the two alleys adjacent to us, except for the Marshall. He just stood in the center of the road, he seemed to be smiling, but knowing Williams that seems impossible. He walked up to the scene despite the extreme disapproval of Battelback. The ghosts seemed to be stuck in time, still in their actions. When the Marshall approached them, the closet seemed to fall back into the present and held its hand forward. Instead of doing the same the Marshal put his hands on the ghost’s shoulders and seemed to be whispering. The ghost, emotionless, nodded, and the scene stuck in time disappeared. All of the ghosts were gone. The Marshal looked back to us and nodded his head up the road. We all got back into formation, slowly and cautiously. It was almost like he knew… After that show, everyone was questioning the Commander, including those red commandos. That time I didn't stop anyone… I understood their confusion. By then we'd already reached the gate. From what I remember it was a big iron gate flanked by big brick walls. From the map back at the FOB the park was completely symmetrical, large in size, and unusually a perfect square. Even the interior was symmetrical, with the same amount of trees flanking the paths, it was obvious the park was anomalous. Anyhow Williams stopped us when he got close to the gate and turned around to address us. I still remember him saying this… I can still hear his gritty voice when I think about it. "Alright. First hurdle… The interior of the park is exceptionally hazardous. From what I gathered when you enter any of the 4 entrances it will teleport you to a different entrance. However, there is a chance you will stay at the same gate. It is designed to confuse and to disorient larger groups. We all will enter this entrance but I can guarantee we all won't enter together and there'll most likely be casualties…" and then he sighed and he continued on with no damn emotion- no concern…! "That's why I needed a group this size, to ensure at least some people get our objective out alive. When you enter, make a b-line for the center with your group. Just follow the path and don't look anywhere but ahead, if you don't, you'll die. Don't stop, until you reach the outer perimeter of the house, or you will die. Don't differ from the path or you will die. Don't look at the path just directly ahead, if not you will die. Don't speak or you will die. Do not touch anything while on the path or you will die. Equip a gas mask or you will die." He stopped and looked over us… I still remember the chills his gaze gave me. Then completely cold, like what was just said didn't happen he coldly asked "If everyone's ready we will start. You will need the aforementioned gas mask and the goggles will be required. Hurry! We are losing time and light."
