Report: Operation SIAM SAM Part One

 Part One: "Strange Men Come to Monument"

December 1998. Norfolk, Virginia. 

In a meeting room at Naval Station Norfolk, FBI Special Agent Sasha Rozenstruik waits. An invitation was given to her by her supervisor, heavily classified and evidently handed down from very high up in the Bureau. It summoned her here. Finally, the door unlatches and a cadre of seven men, three in suits and four in officer's uniforms - she spies colonels, majors, captains - enter. 

They commend her for her work while assigned to Task Force Nemesis, and its efforts to pursue and persecute the international human trafficking ring known as the Dorian Grey Society, alongside FBI Agents Trevor Bloom and Adrian Walck. Likewise they commend herfor her cooperation later aiding Bloom and Walck and Air Force Office of Special Investigations Agent Catherine Connelly in their investigation of "outbreak" in Brattleboro, Vermont. They recognize her hard work, her investigative talents, and her...discretion. They explain that Walck, Bloom, and Connelly are members of a small, hand-picked group of people that work to contain and erase the alien and the supernatural, like what she witnessed in Brattleboro and in Panama. Rozenstruik's mind races back to the fungal horror and its alien puppets stalking the oily, clay tunnels under Vermont. She recalls the horrors hiding in the Panamanian jungle she discovered on those videotapes, of the naked man who could disembowel a man with his mind, raised in the dark without light, love, language, or compassion. 

They recognize potential in Rozenstruik, and wish to bring her in. They don't sugarcoat anything. The work is strenuous, even by the FBI's standards. It is brutal, it is difficult, but it is necessary. Rozenstruik acknowledges and accepts. Over the coming months, she is read-in fully to Delta Green, and christened "Agent MIRIAM" of M-Cell. 

February 1999. Rural Pennsylvania. 

At a disused gas station, amidst blowing snow, lit only by headlights and what few stars penetrate the nighttime clouds. Miriam and Monty meet, as per the latter's orders. 

Monty reads her in on their activities. He tells her of Majestic, and Delta Green's war against it. He tells her the sad reality of Delta Green: that it hasn't had authority, sanction, or official resources for nearly thirty years. It's been supported through lying, cheating, stealing. Its operational budget is the spoils of war, and misappropriated government funds and intelligence community black slush funds. 

He explains in no uncertain terms the standard operating procedure of Delta Green and why it is important. He explains why Majestic must be dissolved. Miriam can't help but notice the trickle of blood from Monty's nose into his moustache as he describes the inhumanities Majestic has visited on the American people. They conclude their meeting in the biting cold and eat a diner before they part ways. 

7: 30 AM. 19 April 1999. Malmstrom AFB, Montana. 

On the 16th of April, M-Cell receives its activation, and is told to muster at Malmstrom AFB in Montana for their briefing on the 19th. Miriam and Morgan fly. Monty drives across the country. 

They're escorted to a hangar with a blackhawk helicopter midway through maintenance. They're lead into it where they're received by Agent OMAR. 

OMAR briefs them on their mission. Operation SIAM SAM. 

For the last five months. M-Cell and its contact in Majestic, "Stingray", have been acting as cut-outs, exchanging communications between A-Cell and the "Rogue Element" within Majestic - a group within the group that wishes to purge its leadership and "renegotiate" the Accord with the Greys. One member of the element, a senior officer or potentially director of MJ-5 Project MOON DUST, has requested an exchange of information between Delta Green and Majestic. They believe Delta Green has been able to gather intelligence on the Greys which Majestic has not been able to, and Majestic has quite a lot of information on the Greys and other phenomena that it knows A-Cell wants. This arrangement, evidently, has promise, and A-Cell has agreed to it. 

Already, two exchanges of so-called "Info packages" have been performed, and with great success. M-Cell is being activated for one that has been deemed crtiically important, but is unfortunately extremely high risk. The info package details some of Majestic's research programs, and "groups of interest" it has identified. A-Cell and the Rogue Element have settled on the drop-off location to be the town of Monument, Montana. Monument was chosen as it's proximity to the research facility where the intelligence is stored means a covert drop is easier for the element's cut-outs, and because it is a highly secluded locale. M-Cell strongly dislikes the location choice, but accepts the mission. The drop-off is scheduled to occur on the 21st. A-Cell wants to deploy the agents ahead of time to give them a chance to scope out the place, and prepare contingency plans to escape should things go sour. 

M-Cell contrives its cover story. They pretend to be a gang of low-life gas station robbers posing as a heavy metal band. They enter Monument and book rooms at the only available place in town, the Cheyenne Inn, whose sole occupants appear to be truckers, loggers, and a group of three washed-up gamblers, blowing through from a streak of poor luck at the indian casinos. M-Cell sweepts it room for bugs. Nothing. They refrain from using the telephones. They learned their lesson at Wehring, Connecticut, and assume the phone lines are tapped. To get an early lay of the land, they take to leaving the Inn and walking down a lonesome stretch of highway to the gas station for some junk food, taking a circuitous route back to the Inn. 

On their talk, Monty and the group notice the power lines. They notice that among the transformer boxes and other implements, the power lines have black, metal cases that are unlike any they've seen attached to power lines anywhere else. They're roughly the size of a jug of milk, with no dials, and only a few lights that do not shine. Stenciled on them reads "DANGER, DO NOT TOUCH". On the way home, they pass a substation on Tumbleweed Road, they notice additional boxes among the substation's transformers. Their stencils read "DANGER. DO NOT TOUCH. IF DAMAGED, NOTIFY SUPERVISOR." Flashing red and blue lights further up the street catch their attention. Apparently, it catches the attention of a lot of people (it occurs to M-Cell that not much must happen in a town like Monument, hence the gawking locals). A car marked "Sheriff's Department" idles behind a black Oldsmobile. A deputy handcuffs and searches the car's driver, a young man. He confiscates the man's camera - a Canon with a heavy magnifying lens, like one a wildlife photographer would use - and his pistol - a beretta. The agents note the car's bumperstickers, one reads "THINKING MEN AGAINST THE ESCHATON", another depicts a hand snuffing out a candle, the smoke creating a mushroom cloud. Below the sticker reads "WWW.THE-DAMASCUS-SYNDROME.COM". In the parking lot of the Cheyenne Inn, another Sheriff's department cruiser (Unit 2) idles. Monty hops into his bronco and checks the police scanner before going in. The Sheriff's office dispatch asks Unit 2 for an update on collecting a statement, to which "Unit 2" replies it is being currently taken. 

M-Cell enters to see the gamblers talking to the deputy. Of the three gamblers, the middle-aged women with grey hair and sunglasses with the southern drawl leads the statement, claiming they were being followed by "that man" who was "taking pictures" of them. Her two companions, a wiry man in a ten-gallon hat and a blonde, offer little in the way. M-Cell enjoys a quick drink at the bar before retreating to their room. Monty immediately begins theorizing the gamblers are the NRO DELTA surveillance team they were warned about, when asked why, he explains: the southerner's accent is fake, and the blonde keeps adjusting her shirt - she's wearing a shoulder holster underneath it and its making her sweat on that side. The Cell debate if they're NRO DELTA, or the "extraction team" Omar mentioned would be on standby. Neither option explains them calling the cops on the man in the Oldsmobile, unless maybe he was NRO DELTA? M-Cell quickly visits the library and uses its computer to visit the website from the Oldsmobile's bumper sticker. He comes across a forum. "The Damascus Syndrome". It explains its name is taken from the infamous 1980 Damascus Titan missile explosion, during which a nuclear missile's fuel tank exploded, destroying its silo and killing one member of the launch team. It appears to a political / military / philosophical discussion forum, debating whether or not humanity is "sufficiently advanced" to wield nuclear power or not. Monty retires to the Cheyenne Inn, still paranoid.