You are not followed in the drive from South Charleston, across the river, and through a drive-thru pharmacy on the way back to the hotel. Once at the hotel you prop Agent Oscar on a luggage cart and sneak him up to your rooms.
Agent Olive reports she is still investigating the purple substance and monitoring the news for any updates on the hikers or about Myers's death. So far her analysis indicates the purple ooze is made up of some kind of parasitic spore, a semi-biological organism that infects a victim via either the respiratory or circulatory systems and likely targets every major muscle group and nerve center in the host body. She looks at Agent Oscar gravely, glad that he is still groggy from the affects of the meds and not wholly aware of his potential situation.
The pair of you leave the gear for later and instead bed down for several hours rest. Agent Olive says she'll nap between tests with the new equipment you brought and let you know if anything happens.
After nearly 11 hours sleeping Olive awakens you to tell you the hikers' bodies have been discovered, slain viciously by some kind of animal or sadistic butcher. The news is releasing little information, but as a concerned FBI consultant she got a bit more from calling the department. Apparently something happened overnight, a series of calls reported abrupt screams in the woods. A team of National Guardsmen equipped with search and rescue dogs combed the area and discovered first the male victim, his genitals ripped from his body and discarded, his throat severed, and several puncture and bite wounds across his body.
A short while ago the woman was also found, not in as bad a shape, but still odd, disconcerting to the investigators. She has not found out much else yet, they are holding it close to the vest at this time.
And so far nothing has been reported about Myers, and no incidents have been reported at his apartment complex.
Oscar is not feeling his best.
Myers is a- a dead end I think. Don't think we're getting any more information from there.
Hopefully, Olive wakes Ormando first so they can discuss Oscar. We need to be sure we can monitor his condition so we can decide if we need to cap him or not.
After Oscar wakes up ....
We need to figure out where these people...things...creatures are hiding out during the day. Are they just lying down and covering up with leaves? Does the sunlight do anything to them? I will bring my flash bangs next time. Anyway to correlate the locations of the attacks, the distances things can travel, etc?
He makes sure Oscar is taking his meds, especially the antibiotics. He texts Olive to see if antibiotics will work on this spore thing.
In fact, Ormando will take a few minutes to put a copy of the symbol (from Meyer's bullets) on Oscar's back, using a sharpie or similar pen.
He will also try to get him in some sunlight.
If we wanna go back, we should look into getting some dirt bikes or something. Freaks can't stab us if we're faster than them.
Where are we?
The three of you are at the hotel, recovering from the previous night's events. It is 6:30 in the evening, having slept 11 hours or so. Agent Olive ordered room service to get you back on your feet and you are enjoying simple burgers, fries, and colas.
The news is currently plastered with coverage of the MURDERED MISSING HIKERS. The entire area has been placed on alert and a curfew is being discussed by the authorities, who believe the killer may still be in the area and residents are at risk due to the number of well to do homes and communities that border the edges of the forest. The area around the forest hosts many local politicians, important businessmen, and other celebrities. Their safety is of paramount concern, at least to themselves, which is putting an additional burden on law enforcement. Added to this there is a crackdown underway downtown as the community wants the homeless issue dealt with immediately, crowding the police department's cells to the point that suspects are being routed for holding down the road to the regional jail as a stop gap measure. Tempers and frustrations are high trying to prevent a panic. Staying under the radar is going to be a tough assignment, and your previous credentials may not buy you much influence with the authorities now.
Agent Olive has been researching the spores and believes that the antibiotics should be helpful in preventing any recovery issues for Agent Oscar. She is concerned however when you discussed the severed arm moving on it's own. She realizes that Myers was similarly infected by the spores, and whomever it was that shot him did so without using a weapon like the Webley. His body was partially intact and could still pose a risk to the public, a risk they are supposed to prevent by order of A CELL. We know the creatures can be seen in broad daylight, as evidenced by the car attack which precipitated the attack on the missing hikers. The addict was out in daylight, though he was relatively sheltered from the sun under the trees. So while they are primarily nocturnal, may even prefer it, we know they can operate in either cycle. If we just leave Myers body to be found who knows the potential damage those spores could cause, even if he is not reanimate and attacks his discoverers? We have maybe two left in the woods, that we know of, but what if just one person became infected at his elder home? We don't know yet if it is the drugs which caused the initial infection but we do know they pass it through physical contact. Oscar is proof of that. In fact, if you had the time, which you don't, she'd prefer to spend time testing his reactivity to stimulii, run a panel of physical stress indicators, and much more to determine any potential effects of his infection, before it is eradicated, if it even is eradicated.
Nope
You find it is so much different dealing with the Unnatural as part of a team, people who see it too, who know it's real, and know enough to deal with it with you. Developing a bond with O CELL and reducing a familial bond by point. They would never understand the way Oscar and Ormando do...
You find that when the chips are down, Agent Oscar can hold his own. He stood his ground and stayed in the fight, even with a stick jammed through his chest he didn't stop, kept that THING at bay until the bullets finished the mess. He fits with what you want in a teammate. You find yourself developing a Bond with your team. Agent Olive seems to have the mission well in hand, if in a dry librarian kind of way. She can't do much in a firefight, but over watch and logistics can win the day too. You got this Fendar, together with these guys you got this...
After your rest and recovery for the previous nights ordeal you find a tiny bit of hope in that gun you found, a weapon that at least in this moment works for you.
Nope
You find you can trace the symbols well enough on yourself, the walls, the furniture, whatever you want but only on Agent Oscar with his permission as Agent Olive attempts to stop you, You don't know if that will help or hurt his recovery... In truth you realize you may be deluding yourself, that the effects of the symbol are nothing without the power of faith and belief behind them. You know enough to know you don't know how or why the symbols work for the gun, and you have no place to start to gain such understanding, at least not yet. But there may be someone else who does. Agent Olive perhaps. Given some time after the mission and mayhaps Olive can point you in a direction to start, to delve into the things not meant to be known. After all, would A CELL be happy if they found out she actually understood as much as she's let on, not to mention that she likely knows a bit more than that?
You find that when the chips are down, Agent Ormando was there for you. He may not have been in Kabul, but he could have been, he fits that well. You find yourself developing a Bond with Agent Ormando, but are not sure if he reciprocates. Agent Olive though seems to have your back, in her own way. She can't do much in a firefight, but overwatch and logistics can win a fight too.
You are healing well enough, but the sutures are fresh and still fairly tight, any rough action may result in the wounds being re-opened. For a few days you will need to make a Constitution check before any strenuous activity to prevent tearing and bleeding.
Your rest is somewhat disturbed, the stress and strain of the battle, the damage, and the realization that this crap is REALLY real can be too much sometimes. It had all been so much easier before you stumbled upon all this, before last night, before the incident. It was easier when you were just a member of one of the fire teams, go here, shoot that, recover this, bang boom bam. The Lt and Sarge could do all the thinking, all you had to do was point, squeeze, and spray the problem away. Kind of like how Agent Ormando did with that THING last night. If only you could go back to those simpler, straight forward days.
Agent Olive gives a rundown of options, as she sees them.
The suspect creatures are contained, maybe, by the police cordone right now. In daylight we don't have much hope of getting through the lines into the forest without having to explain ourselves. We need to wait another couple of hours until nightfall if we want to try and return to the campsite undetected and resume the search.
The apartment building has not reported anything but that can change. How often did Myers have visitors, interactions with the other residents, the staff? The clock is ticking on his discovery, and we won't keep this contained if we kill the two in the woods but his body creates new ones at the elder home. At some point we need to sanitize that situation, maybe look a bit closer at what he was doing that put him on this case in the first place.
Agent Oscar's vest is ruined. That limits our capabilities somewhat. We have one weapon which we know works on the creatures. I wish I knew more about how the symbols work with it, to try and do more of that, but she needs more to go on, and that information is not here in this room, or thankfully online for just anyone to stumble upon, or at least she prays not.
We are on a deadline here for our real jobs, I know I need to be back to work in less than 36 hours. We need viable options and we need a plan. Before this goes sideways and too far out of the box to be crammed back inside. I can reach out to A CELL for assistance, but that will likely not be timely. We came on scene what, at least two days after Myers last reported an SOS?
OK. No drawing on Oscar he says with a grin.
I think we need to sanitize the old folks home soon. Can you disable the security system and loop the cameras so we don't show on film?
Ormando begins checking his gear.
Can we disinfect this somehow? As simple as bleach? And is there a way to detect this? IR? UV? Other ideas?
Agent Olive thinks given a bit of time, 15-20 minutes onsite, yes she can access the system and disable the cameras remotely. She doesn't have the equipment needed to set up a loop but could monitor your progress and disable on the fly as needed.
You have learned the spores are visible in tissue and on bone as a purplish tint under normal light, orange under IR conditions. It responds violently to the bullets Myers carried. Agent Olive tested a small sample of the spore and it dusted when touched by one of the Webley rounds, so in a pinch you might use it as a litmus test on potentially contaminated articles or persons.
To recap what you have learned thus far...
There may potentially be at least two, uncertain, White Shadows active in the forest. The homeless addict did not fit the descriptions of the shadows and as such may only be a lackey or infected sycophant. It may be that Myers injured or killed the creature which attacked him, but the evidence is too thin to make solid assumptions. You will need to return to the forest and locate the nest/lair/whatever of these shadows, and if possible, eliminate them.
The addict seemed to indicate at least one of the White Shadows was in charge, a goddess or similar indicator, and that she had involvement with others aside from himself. He was addicted to a yet to be analyzed drug sample for which he was willing to openly attack armed combatants to recover. More research needs to be done on the substance and it's origins. That can be shelved or sent back to A CELL for further study.
Did Agent Olive miss anything? She has not always been in the field with you and may have missed something.
Oscar is less concerned about the timeline than Olive. His cover identity is itself a deep cover operative so disappearing for a bit isn't out of the realm of possibility for him.
Those drugs or spores or whatever were making him heal like something out of a comic book. His jaw reattached itself after I broke it with a rifle butt and that arm was still moving. Something is interacting with clinically dead or severely damaged tissue.
He looks down at his chest. If we're contacting A Cell maybe we ought to send an image of the glyph on the bullets as well. If this falls through for whatever reason the next team will want to know more about what's happening than when we started. Maybe someone at A Cell can reply with useful intel anyhow.
I think we need to do a couple of things. Clean up our gear Which Ormando is already doing.
Destroy the things in the woods that are eating folks. We have one weapon for that, so we can work in a team and the best shooter gets the gun. The other guy is ready to parry and block and generally fight defensively. Moving through the woods and ambushing bad guys ought to be in skill set Ormando looks at Oscar here.
Can Olive somehow access a military satellite and use it for thermal imaging to help narrow down the search?
We also need to clean up Meyer's apartment - check out what is left, and interview as many occupants (patients and staff) as we need to in order to screen out any infected guys. Also search the basement thoroughly.
And we need to worry about those other guys who were in Meyer's place
Thoughts on what to do first? Or something else? Or not do some of this??
Agent Olive informs you she does not have any contact information for military or scientific satellites that might provide any assistance in scanning the area. They could make the request of A CELL, but that would take some time, and depending on where the satellites are currently stationed, more time for such aid to be available if approved.
She does confirm Myers' apartment building does not have a basement, just a ground floor storage area, little more than temporary furniture storage as tenants move in or out, according to their website. She is concerned that if the spores allow for full regeneration, or place the subject under the control of this "goddess" that Myers may have reconstituted himself, or be doing so currently. In such a case his frame of mind is completely unknown, his next course of action entirely uncertain.
She does state she will attempt to access local area security camera footage and run facial recognition software to try and isolate the men in question. This search will take some time and more resources than she has available here, but she can pass the request over to A CELL, using the description of the car, the license plate, time of contact, etc. and let them go from there.
Agent Olive does indicate the carvings on the bullets are known to A CELL, items of power used to protect against or harm other Mythos creatures. Looking at them further and communicating with a contact I have learned that apparently not all of the THINGS out there play nice together, so they devised ways of harming one another which people have learned to use, tragically in most cases, to do as well...
I think the most important thing we have to do is find whatever is happening in the woods. Before that we can make sure Myers doesn't get up and start killing people where we left him, but if we deal with things in the woods and dispose of his body it probably doesn't matter what the locals find there. Let's start at his apartment. Run that facial recognition if you can, we're going to break in and clean up. Hope they haven't killed our keycards yet.
Good plan, lets roll
Ormando packs up his gear, and offers his vest to Oscar. You are the one with a belly wound - you get the only vest we have left
Do you want the Webley? I can take point, and you shoot what I keep from ambushing us?
Makes sense to me.
We drive to the retirement home. Going under the assumption someone is always at the front desk, we approach the rear of the building.
Ormando has his 10mm Glock in a shoulder rig, under a plain black jacket. He wears a hat too, to shield his face as best he can.
He parks two blocks away, and they walk quickly to the back of the building, hoping Olive has closed down the cameras and turned off the mag lock on the rear door.
He also has his combat knife in a small of the back holster. He figures if it comes to it, he can block a creature while Oscar shoots it with the .455 Webley.
Oscar carries the Webley and his own sidearm and follows after Ormando.
The outer doors are normal lock and security type doors, with a normal key lock and fire alarm press bar. The building is not high security and has no remote access that Agent Olive can locate. The visitor's badges were merely visual props which allowed the staff to recognize non-residents by sight and verify their allowance to residential areas.
Agent Olive provides you with a small in line tap you can connect to the building's video circuit which will allow her to monitor the camera feeds but she will not be able to manipulate them as the system is otherwise a dog-brained plug and play system. You would have to locate an access point for the video surveillance system to connect the device however. There may be an access point on the side, in a junction box, or in a utility service area. The cameras cover the elevator landings, the front desk, the main entrance, and the commons area, if remembered correctly.
The building can be accessed by either of two exterior rear fire exits, the main front entrance, or the side climbing fire escape. The roof top access had the fire alarm disabled previously or was otherwise non-operational. It was one of the rear exits that triggered the fire alarm when exited the previous day.
We will climb the fire escape and go for the roof top access.
Oscar follows after Ormando.
After a short albeit tense climb your team reached the top floor of the fire escape. While a few cars passed by below none appeared to take notice of your approach and ascent.
A brief scramble lifts the pair of you up over the remaining wall and onto the roof. The rooftop exit is still unlocked, the stairwell below empty. You find a security access box and attach the video sensor Agent Olive provided. She confirms via radio the tap is working and that no one appears active near the elevators on Myers' floor. The night staffer is at the main desk while a second attendant is cleaning up the commons area.
You should be clear to enter the building and proceed to Myers' apartment.
Oscar allows Ormando to take point this time.
Not looking to get stabbed again.
Ormando moves to the stairs and down to Meyer's apartment. He proceeds cautiously, but not too slowly. Eyes open and listening and smelling...
Once he gets to the door, he pushes on it, then tries the doorknob.
vs. 70 rating
No one seems to be active in the stairs or hallway this evening. You hear the faint sound of television programs or music playing in one or two places but overall the floor is quiet.
The door to Myers' apartment remains locked, potentially undisturbed since Agent Olive latched it on her way out. You have the key A CELL provided you if you wish to use it.
The air near the door smells very faintly of the decay you detected earlier from the wounds Myers had suffered, but nothing otherwise stands out from the apartment. The lights inside appear to be off, and no sounds emanate from within.
Oscar readies the webley and waits for Ormando to open the door.
Ormando unlocks the door with the key, then pushes it open gently and steps back. Depending on what he sees (like some disembodied arm crawling toward him) he will move into the room. He will look for some thing to use as a shield - a kitchen chair or similar - the theory being that if something launches itself at him, he can fend it off better with the chair, while Oscar shoots it.
If nothing is there when he opens the door, he will reach inside and flip on the lights before moving in.
Aside from the smell nothing immediately jumps out at you as you open the front door. The odor smells weakly as did the homeless addict from the forest. A mix of rotting meat and overly sweet fruits, with a trace of some kind of oily, slick sticky residue.
The entry area remains very much as you imagine Agent Olive left it. The balcony door is closed but the blinds open, the floor is covered in scattered papers, and the birthday card and gift sit prominently on the table nearby. Nothing moves in the kitchenette, nor down the hallway to the bedroom, bath, and closets.
Ormando moves slowly along the hall, very much on alert.
When they clear the rooms, he begins to search in closets, under beds and furniture, etc. He keeps something handy to block any attacks, and asks that Oscar stay handy also.
vs 60%
vs 0%
vs 60
Breakdown of what you find in the apartment...
The boxes and papers scattered around the floor seem to relate to a series of accounting and tax receipts for a variety of companies, marked with dates and times collected, going back over the last few years. Nothing easily recognizable marks their relevance or why Myers had these here in the living room.
There are also a few items which were related to Myers' search for the white shadows, various highlighted sighting reports, a spreadsheet tracking sightings by date, time, and location, a few witness statements, photos of the graveyard areas, and vehicle license plate lists.
MISSING: Violet Glessen
Last Seen: March 25, 2017
Age at disappearance: 9
Hair: Blonde
Eyes: Green
Last seen wearing: Green sweatshirt, blue jeans, white tennis shoes.
Violet was last seen in the South Hills area walking over to a friend's house on Kanawha Forest Road. If you have any information about Violet please contact the City of Charleston Police Department. A hotline number is listed.
An empty rocks glass sits on the back shelf of the sink, drab remnants of rum faintly recognizable if sniffed. A large post-it note hangs from the broken mirror, reading "He tried to warn you. He failed. He tried to fix it himself. He failed. We did this before he failed again. Sorry you must now clean this up, or not, just another mess he left undone." A small green triangle is doodled in the corner of the note, upside down.
Take the Webley's holster or leave it? We can always find a holster for it
Looking at the bathroom, he says Looks like someone else got here before us. On our side, or the opposition, or someone else?
Ormando will take the machete, under the theory that is is better than his combat knife at fending off a bad guy. He would not mind the katana, but can't see a way to carry it well, and it looks good enough to be traceable.
He collects bleach from the bathroom, and douses the kitchen trash can and surrounding area thoroughly.
Ormando is careful to wear gloves while doing all this work.
He soaks down the bathroom area again too.
Oscar, I think we leave the body untouched and as is. We just need to get rid of the weird stuff. Agree?
Oscar grabs the note and pockets it.
Agreed. Anything that looks like it links to DG or anything that looks like he was anything more than a paranoid old man.
Oscar begins flipping through books in case something is folded in between the pages and gathering up the paperwork in the living room.
Data is rarely useless.
If the bleach isn't killing the goo Oscar will try tossing a round from the webley into the middle of it.
Hope this won't catch fire or anything.
Agent Ormando takes a few minutes dousing the kitchen trash can and bag with the remaining bleach, watching as it begins to discolor and breakdown the purple goo inside. Unfortunately the bleach runs out before the entirety of the bag contents are thoroughly saturated, but it appears to be destroying the bulk of the substance.
Meanwhile Agent Oscar flips through the bookcase contents, trying to discern any titles which may be of use to Delta Green, or should not be left behind for any authorities to ponder over.
• A paperback book: "Astronomy For Dummies".
• A paperback book: "The God Delusion" by Richard Dawkins.
• A hardback of Sarah Palin's biography "Going Rogue" - but the woman on the front cover is not Sarah Palin.
• A copy of "Founding Fathers, Secret Societies: Freemasons, Illuminati, Rosicrucians, and the Decoding of the Great Seal" by Robert Hieronimus, Ph.D.
• A hardback copy of Katherine Briggs' "An Encyclopedia of Fairies" published in 1815.
• A hardcover book: "A Hieroglyphic Dictionary of Egyptian Coffin Texts".
• A copy of "The Invisibles: Voodoo Gods in Haiti".
• A paperback book: "Fundamentals of Physical Surveillance: A Guide for Uniformed an Plainclothes Personnel".
• A stained copy of Gray's Anatomy.
• A paperback book: "Greek Fire, Poison Arrows, and Scorpion Bombs: Biological & Chemical Warfare in the Ancient World".
• A well-used paperback copy of Ronald Hutton's "The Pagan Religons of the Ancient British Isles: Their Nature and Legacy".
• A signed paperback copy of Richard "Demo Dick" Marcinko's "Leadership Secrets of the Rogue Warrior: A Commando's Guide to Success".
• A paperback copy of "Sinister Forces: A Grimoire of American Political Witchcraft - Book Two: A Warm Gun".
• A self-published loose leaf book entitled "My Time In Hell" by George Meinhoff.
• A paperback book: "Field Guide to Squids and Octopods of the Eastern North Pacific and Bering Sea".
• A hardback UK edition of "The Hunt for Zero Point: Inside the Classified World of Antigravity Technology".
• A paperback book: "Unspeakable Acts, Ordinary People: The Dynamics of Torture".
• A hardcover book: "Abnormal Child Psychology".
• A paperback book: "The Stone Sky: Spelunking in the Mountains and Minds of Antarctica".
• A hardcover copy of "Parapsychology: A Concise History".
• A hardcover copy of "Voodoo and Hoodoo: Their Tradition and Craft as Revealed by Actual Practitioners".
• A paperback "Project Moon Dust - Beyond Roswell - Exposing the Government's Continuing Covert UFO Investigations and Cover-Ups".
• A paperback book: "Guide for the Care and Use of Laboratory Animals: Eighth Edition".
• A 9th grade History textbook entitled "Our American Experience". The bookplate says the book came from the Marion County Consolidated School System.
• A paperback book: "Storey's Guide to Raising Pigs: Care, Facilities, Management, Breed Selection".
• A dog-eared copy of 1960s-era US Army Improvised Weapons and Explosives handbook, full of highlighted passages and brief notes scribbled in margins.
• A hardcover book, "The Head with the Long Yellow Hair: Life Among Headhunters".
• An US Army operator's manual for the BGM-71 TOW missile.
• A paperback book, "The U.S. Army/Marine Corps Counterinsurgency Field Manual".
• A 1997 Ordinance Survey roadmap of Greater London and the surrounding metropolitan area, UK.
I think Oscar planned to just toss a marked bullet into the trash can, not shoot it....but I would vote against that. We might need all the marked bullets we have for the next thing that is out there.
We will take the holster.
Is there anything else we can use to wipe out the stuff? Lighter fluid, windex, etc?
We will also tie up the bag to keep the fumes inside with the goo - maybe that will help do it in.
@ Oscar - should we double or triple bag the stuff and take it with us?
Oscar grabs the army manuals, the history textbook, Going Rogue, and the torture and surveillance books, tossing them unceremoniously into his duffel.
Taking this stuff out of the room seems like a terrible idea. We could try burning it on the stove or microwaving it if those are available inside the room.
Agent Ormando tucks the machete into his waistband and quickly searches the kitchen for any additional household cleaners or disinfectants to use on the goo but turns up empty. On a hunch he then checks the cabinets and finds a small bottle of white vinegar in a cabinet and a bottle of apple cider vinegar in the refrigerator. He pops the tops of these, pouring them into the old bleach bottle, shakes, and drains them also into the kitchen trash can.
The mix seems to saturate the remaining goo and the can now reeks of vinegar and bleach rather than the decaying rot from when you first entered the apartment. With any luck the disgusting goo in the can has been neutralized and likely smells bad enough to discourage anyone from digging further through the mess. If you wish to do so you there are additional trash bags and paper towels, etc. should you want to re-bag the mess and take it with you for burning or other disposal.
01 A hardback of Sarah Palin's biography "Going Rogue" - but the woman on the front cover is not Sarah Palin. Every photograph in the book - from childhood to adulthood - is of someone other than who you recognize as Sarah Palin. The text and history is otherwise exactly the same as what you recognize as belonging to the "real" Sarah Palin.
02 A paperback book: "Fundamentals of Physical Surveillance: A Guide for Uniformed and Plainclothes Personnel".
03 A paperback book: "Unspeakable Acts, Ordinary People: The Dynamics of Torture".
04 A 9th grade History textbook entitled "Our American Experience". The bookplate says the book came from the Marion County Consolidated School System.
05 A dog-eared copy of 1960s-era US Army Improvised Weapons and Explosives handbook, full of highlighted passages and brief notes scribbled in the margins.
06 A US Army operator's manual for the BGM-71 TOW missile.
07 A paperback book:"The U.S. Army/Marine Corps Counterinsurgency Field Manual".
The book list looks right to me.
Oscar, I think we need to patrol down the halls, doing some sniffing for more of this rot smell. Hopefully we don't find any. If we do, we will work through it then. Sound alright?
Books are right.
Not a terrible idea. Hey, you recognize this woman on the cover here?
Clearing out the last of your traces, together you proceed back down the hallway to the stairwell which will lead you back to the roof. You spend a bit of time smelling around the halls and at the tenant doors on this floor. Mostly you get whiffs of cheap spray disinfectants, the musk of old age, and the occasional scent of used Depends, but nothing like the rot and decay evidence by the purple goo. It seems likely none of the other inhabitants of the floor have been exposed to the injuries Myers received.
vs a base of 50. Nada
Reaching the end of the hall and finding no easily discernible indication of contamination, you both enter the stairwell, climb up to the roof and survey the area before making the long climb back down the fire escape.
Once on the ground you make your way back to the car and Agent Olive, watching for any sign of pursuit or interest.
Oscar takes a closer look through all the books looking for notes made by Myers or any other disconnects like "Sarah Palin".
While Oscar roots through the pile of stuff he grabbed, Ormando drives to a safe location to pull over. He unfolds a map of the area and tries to determine the best spot to make a patrol to locate the source of the weirdness.
hmmm...this lake in the center of the pattern of red dots looks promising. Or, it is at least a geographical feature in the middle ish of the area of lost pets and shadow sightings.
He looks over at Oscar, pouring through his material hope Ranger boy can make it through this. He had a stick in his gut about 24 hrs ago, but looks like he is keeping his s&^% together.
He waits for what Oscar finds.