Complex 347-5

GM- Brian

Description: It's winter, Dec 5, 1984, at Litle Rock Air Force Base, Arkansas, home of the Titan II Missiles. To the northwest, outside Brockton city near one of the missile silos, a temporary base has been set up. You are led through the gate only after showing your security papers and badge, where you are assembled inside a large tent filled with folding metal chairs, half already occupied. A podium and blackboard are set before you. Those military members already gathered stood when General Francis Hart (of the Strategic Air Command) entered and stepped to the podium. The large barrel-chested man with a breast full of ribbons below his nametag surveyed you, his NEST (Nuclear Emergency Search Team) team, lit a cigarette, and referenced a folder with your biography included as he ordered, “If you will please stand and introduce yourselves.”

Anthony Aroni, (Julian): You had dreams to be a fighter pilot one day. The Air Force took one look at your bulky size and realized you would never fit in a fighter jet or helicopter cockpit. You took what you figured would be the next most exciting job, Missileer, which it was not. You cannot shake the feeling that you can vaporize an entire city with a turn of the key.

Dr. Dean Rathbone, (Koen): You are the Medical member of NEST. In the late 60’s and 70’s, your work was dedicated to ending the use of nuclear weapons. By 1981 your free spirit and rebellious streak was tamped down. You cut your long hair, put on a button-down shirt and tie, and joined the Department of Energy, hoping to change the system from the inside. You still have reservations you did the right thing but if good people like you do not prevent these weapons from killing millions, who will?

Earl Kazmart, (Josh): You are a Structural Engineer and the military arm of the NEST with EOD experience. As a tunnel rat during the Vietnam War: you went down into Vietcong tunnels and cleared out enemy positions. It left you hardened and scared, but you used the GI Bill to go to a top technical university. After earning your degree, you could not escape the military lifestyle and joined the Army Corps of Engineers. You transferred to NEST four years ago.

Ryan Hartigan, (Bill): You are married to your work, spending 14 hours a day pouring over equations and working out complex problems. You have been in command for two years as the Lead Field Scientist for the team. You were picked because you know the science behind weapon systems better than anyone and have the will to lead a team into great danger.

Dr. Rathbone (Dr. R) couldn’t help but warn, “Sir, you know those cigarettes will shorten your lifespan by years.” Hart’s answer was to scowl as he lit another cigarette. The doctor couldn’t help but notice the general’s jittery hand when he lit the cigarette: health, nerves?

The Briefing: A Lieutenant (Lt) handed out copies of the timeline of events along with the list of crew compositions of both the missile team and the Omega rescue team. Satisfied the full team was present, General Hart began, "Welcome team Papa. At 11:00 a.m. today the 4-man missile crew of Complex 347-5 reported a fuel leak alarm. Over the course of the next 2 hours there were three massive radiation spikes. The 6-member Omega rescue team entered the complex 50 minutes after the initial alarm and reported no fuel leak nor detectable radiation via their Geiger counters. We lost communication 2 hours ago." All Papa team members thought it was VERY odd that no radiation lingered, "It doesn't just go away. Plutonium-238 has a half-life of 87 years!"

Next, the Lt handed out their top-secret orders: 1) Ensure the launch command is not compromised. 2) Prevent a premature detonation of the warhead. 3) Assess the level of damage to both the silo and the warhead.

Finally, the Lt flipped the chalkboard over to reveal a chalked diagram of a Titan missile complex. General Hart’s concluding directive was, "God speed. Go save my warhead and prevent World War III."

Entry Shaft: The team inventoried their gear (today's access codes, Geiger counters, radiation badges, vapor detectors, and job specific kits) before dressing in their HAZMAT suits. As team leader, Ryan warned, "Remember to speak up if your radiation badge begins to chirp. We could be dealing with caustic compounds that can eat right thru your suits. Careful what you touch! Not to mention the extremely flammable hypergolic propellant!! No smoking!"

They stood at the entry point pondering whether to use the elevator or the stairs. Flickering lights and the threat of a fuel leak convinced them to start climbing down the eight floors to the tunnel access. At the bottom of the stairs, they came upon the body of Omega team member Eliot Alter (fuel technician) also in a hazmat suit but with his helmet and gloves removed. While Dr R knelt over the body to confirm he died of acute radiation poisoning, the others confirmed there was no current radiation via the Geiger counters. Not even on Alter whose radiation badge was pegged bright red. "How the hell does his badge show exposure, yet none remains?! With his body half inside the elevator, it looks like he was trying to escape. The pain must have been unbearable for him to take off part of his suit."

And that's when the lights began to flicker again. Anthony tried to plug his headset into the entry shafts communication box to report to the general. Static. [Electrical 99] He removed the box only to find it had been sabotaged! Dr R suggested the team split up while Ryan insisted the team stay together. Earl reminded everyone of the flickering lights and how the Power-House was just below them, “We might find the cause of the flickering lights down there.”

As Earl led the way down with flashlight in hand, he began to hear a faint banging noise. At the bottom of the ladder, to the far side of the room, he saw the silhouette of a half-suited man standing before the generator with a metal pipe in his hand, slowly and rhythmically tapping the generator. Earl called out but got no response from the man who stood without helmet or top portion of his suit.

Dr R approached and confirmed the man was covered in radiation burns. So severe that Omega member Alfred Clark should have been in severe pain if not already dead. Again, the Geiger counters were silent. Ryan rushed forward to pull Clark away from the generator to prevent him from causing more damage. Where Ryan touched skin fell away much like a burn patient. [Sanity check.] Even without the pipe in hand and removed from the generator, Clark continued his rhythmic arm motion swing.

Earl pulled out his duct tape and taped Clark to the ladder with the explanation, "He's already dead. No reason to let him cause more damage." Ryan questioned the status of the missile team, "If they are anything like Clark, there could be an inadvertent launch. We need to get to the crew module!"

Command Module: Anthony entered the access code to gain entry to the Launch Command Module where he found Lt Vickers slumped over his chair in his 2-piece blue fatigue uniform. As he stepped closer, he saw the medical kit on the table and surgical forceps in Vicker’s right hand. Dr R stepped forward to check his patient and realized Vickers had used the forceps to pluck out his own eye! [Sanity check.] He still had a weak pulse. The doctor’s diagnosis, “Gnarly dude.”

With Vickers laid out on the floor, Anthony sat in the command chair to access the control panel. [Computer 000- fumble], “The system has been hijacked! There is a bunch of non-English code scrolling across the screen.” Anthony tried CNTRL-ALT-DEL to reboot the computer without success. He reached behind the console to unplug it, yet everything remained running. The room lights flickered. And that's when Anthony read on the screen "Launch Initiated".

Under the flickering lights, Ryan spotted Vicker’s eyeball on the floor! And near it, a slime trail (slug like) on the floor that led from Vicker's chair to behind more consoles.

He and Earl found a small dead jellyfish-like alien creature with six tendrils and a scalpel embedded in its body. [Sanity check.] And another sanity check when they realized the creature must have crawled out of Vicker’s eye socket! And that's when Vicker's left eye flickered and he momentarily woke to weakly warn, "Must stop missile." Anthony confirmed there were no launch keys inserted in the panels. And Dr R confirmed Vicker's key was still on a chain around his neck. 

Anthony removed the cover panel to the launch control and found black mold with an electrical pulse dancing across the internal wiring. Ryan pulled out his lab kit and tried to analyze the mold: nothing terrestrial! He tried to use a scalpel to remove a sample but suffered an electrical shock: its self-defense mechanism.

Earl used the station’s comm gear to report to General Hart, "So far we have found three bodies and something alien." Meanwhile, at the same time, Anthony sprayed the fire extinguisher on the mold hoping to create an electrical short. The entire Command Module began to violently shake then stopped. And that's when the comms went dead! Dr R mused, "Man should not meddle with things he does not fully understand. Like nuclear weapons."

And that's when all heard something from down below. Anthony and Earl descended into the darkness with flashlight and crowbar in hand. They soon returned with a duct taped lunch box that rattled in their hand to imply something alive was inside. Earl offered it to Ryan, "You said you want a living sample of the alien?"

At least the lights flickered back on. With the panel readout of launch initiated, and their inability to disconnect the launch panel, they realized they needed to get to the missile silo to prevent its launch. Ryan stayed behind to continue his lab work on the mold in hopes he could disable the launch from this end.

Tunnel Access: Anthony, Earl, and the doctor stood before the tunnel access door that led to the silo. Strange markings were painted with blood in cylindrical patterns. Anthony puzzled how it almost looked like Morse Code. Once they entered and proceeded down the tunnel, they saw a blue-uniformed figure laying on the floor nearest the silo access door. Dr R checked 2nd Lieutenant Stone for a pulse as the others used their Geiger counters to check for radiation. Nothing except that Stone's stomach was torn open and his guts hung out.

As they stepped over the body to access the door, the entire facility went pitch black. Red lights throughout the facility begin flashing as an audible alarm announced, "Launch sequence activated. 20 minutes."

Command Module: Working under pulsing red lights, Ryan used his lab kit to analyze the mold: not native to Earth. Using a clipboard, he scooped up the dead jellyfish alien body and pressed it against the mold hoping to short-out the alien invasion. Nothing. Picking up the lunch box and cutting the tape, he opened the lid and threw the contents against the mold. A small black and white cat bounced off the mold and ran away.

Missile Silo: The trio opened the door and gazed at the massive missile before them. The Titan II loomed in the silo’s dim interior, its once-pristine surface now corrupted by black mold and invasive tendrils that seemed to burrow into its skin like parasitic roots. Electrical sparks danced across the moldy surface.

Three Hazmat suited men (1st Lt Wilder, 2nd Lt Cruz, and airman Tingle) knelt on the mid-level platform as if in reverence to the missile as they prayed, "Deliver their remains to Azathoth." They too had their masks off and were suffering from radiation poisoning. And another audible alarm sounded, "Launch in 18 minutes." 

Earl rushed forward with his crowbar and cracked Tingle's skull who crumpled forward and fell down the shaft another eight floors to the bottom. The other two other men stood in anger to oppose Earl.

Anthony realized if the missile launched, the Russians might be spooked into a retaliatory launch of their own. Or retaliate with a world ending response! He thought of his options: dump the fuel, damage the warhead, or sabotage the guidance system. Anthony announced over his suit-intercom his plan to dump the fuel. Ryan heard the message and gave up his Command Module efforts.

Wrestle Mania: Earl whacked Lt Wilder and dislodged the man's left eyeball from where another jellyfish alien crawled out. While Earl stomped on the jellyfish alien, Lt Cruz tried to grapple him. Dr R tried to pull them apart without success. Another announcement, "15 minutes."

With the jellyfish parasite gone, Wilder crumpled to the floor dead. Earl was locked in a struggle as Cruz tried to maneuver both of them over the edge of the platform to their deaths. Dr R managed to pull them farther from the edge.

Fuel Lever: Anthony reached the bottom of the shaft and fumbled to remove the fuel access paneling. Frustrated, he happened to notice a large hole in the concrete pad below the missile. The inside of the hole was oozing with a large black blob with many whipping black tendrils.

With Earl and Cruz locked in a grapple, Dr R punched to stun Cruz but hit Earl instead. And that's when Ryan stepped into the silo to witness the struggle and heard the latest announcement, "9 minutes to Launch."

The struggle continued, teetering closer to the edge of the platform as the doctor noticed an increase in the electrical pulse across the mold on the missile. As if something imminent was to happen: the launch?!

Maybe sweat and fear cursed Anthony's attempts to remove the paneling. Ryan hustled as he tried to descend the ladder to assist Anthony. And that's when he saw the Hazmat-suited body fall past and Anthony heard the nearby thud as he was suddenly splattered by gore from the dead body. Little did they know…

Dr R tried to rescue Earl: [fumble 000] the doctor slipped on Wilder's spilled blood and fell off the edge of the platform to his death eight floors below.

With Ryan at his side, Anthony finally pulled off the paneling and was able to move the lever to open the fuel valve to begin the release of the hypergolic missile propellant (hydrazine fuel and nitrogen tetroxide oxidizer). It was only a matter of seconds for the mold sparks to ignite the highly combustible fuel... "RUN! GET THE HELL OUT!"

As Ryan and Anthony climbed the ladder, they saw another body fall to its death. They arrived at the platform to find Earl panting from the exhaustion of his fight.

Under flashing red lights and impending doom, they rushed through the tunnel toward the entry shaft where they climbed into the elevator and began their slow assent as classical elevator music teased their sanity.

The massive explosion pushed the warhead through the concrete closure cap of the silo and launched it about a hundred yards away from the site. Explosive fuel blasted through the tunnel and acted as a propellant launching the elevator rapidly upward and out of the open entry shaft.

EPILOGUE

NORAD (North American Aerospace Defense Command at the underground Peterson Space Force Base in Colorado Springs, Colorado) personnel suddenly sat up at their consoles as they reported to their commander, “Colonel Banks! We have an outbound missile tracking from Arkansas.” They quickly ran diagnostics and projections as to its destination. More importantly, they called their BMEWS (Ballistic Missile Early Warning System) sites across northern Canada to report any Russian launches! As for the Russians: their operators also sighted the missile launch. Quick calls and heightened tension before the technicians reported the object was not ballistic but rather space bound. The USA President’s Red Phone lit up with a call from the Russian President as they de-escalated the incident.

Ryan, Earl, and Anthony were quarantined for weeks to not only heal their battered wounds but also to debrief them and remind them of the top-secret security requirements of their hushed silence of all events.

Yet strangely over the next few months, Earl was killed in a car crash. Anthony died of a drug overdose. And Ryan... was meet by a mysterious woman who invited him to join Delta Green.

BEHIND THE CURTAIN

Their last message announcement of an “alien” promoted General Hart to call another team into action. Delta Green killed Earl and Anthony for knowing too much.

An ancient alien spaceship was buried beneath the ICBM silo, crashed there thousands of years ago. It is a living thing; designed to house and protect the crew. However, the ship’s crew died in the crash, but the ship never died. It sat dormant, trapped in the earth, waiting to return the crew’s corpses, adherent worshippers of Azathoth in deep space. Upon awaking last week and breaking through the concrete base of the silo, the Living Ship released spores that bloomed into small spiderlike creatures that replaced the frontal lobes of the crew members. The spores also bloomed inside all of the launch system computers. The Living Ship used the crew to crack open the warhead casing and attach an energy sponge to siphon the radiation from the warhead and power their spaceship. The intent was to launch the missile out of the way so their Ship could takeoff into space.

The fuel leak alarm was an erroneous interpretation of the mold breaking through the concrete floor. The three radiation spikes occurred when the energy sponge partially siphoned off the plutonium from the warhead.

Finally, here is a link to the real 1980 explosion at Little Rock AFB:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1980_Damascus_Titan_missile_explosion