Chương 81: Interlude | Case File C02A, C39B, A90E

CASE FILE C02A: WYOMING AUDIO TRANSCRIPT This audio file was recorded by Handler Wyoming with Handler Texas and Handler Georgia. Before this recording, Handler Wyoming is the first and sole compiler of—what the Institute is now officially calling— The Point Hope Anomaly. Due to the depth and scope of the case, Handler Wyoming has requested The Inner Circle for extra support and funding. Handler Texas and Handler Georgia are assisting with compiling the evidence against the unknown Anomaly.

This transcript was recovered from the Montrose Institute internal audio archive. Date redacted. [Audio begins – low hum, shuffling of papers, intermittent feedback. Three voices are heard in the background. Two male (Wyoming, Georgia) and one female (Texas)] WYOMING: Alright, let's begin. This is Handler Wyoming, recording. Present are Handler Texas and Handler Georgia. Location undisclosed, per Command protocols.

(pause; a chair creaks) For the record, this session concerns the ongoing investigation into what the Institute is now designating as The Point Hope Anomaly. I'll be briefing my associates here on the situation as it currently stands. I have Handlers Texas and Georgia with me tonight. TEXAS: (grumbling) Thought this was supposed to be routine case support, sir. This looks like grunt work. Why the hell are we the ones doing the grunt work again? Can't some other agent do this with you, Wyoming?

GEORGIA: (dry) Because apparently this involves going through half a library's worth of priority incident reports. Handlers' eyes only, genius. That's why Wyoming needs us. WYOMING: (quiet chuckle) This ain't so bad once you get used to it and after a shitload of coffee. You'll find this one isn't as routine, so you wouldn't get bored if that's what you're concerned about, Tex. (sound of folders being placed on the table) You're looking at more than two years-worth of data so far.

Corroborated sightings, disappearances, unsolved assaults, witness testimonies, and a rash of suicides—stretching from the Selene foothills all the way west to the coasts, and then through the northern borders of Canada, and then all the way down to the borders of Mexico. There's at least two dozen Rogues sighted within the area. GEORGIA: Jesus. Are you sure that's correct? WYOMING: Yes, that's correct, handler. TEXAS: (laughs) You must be joking. No anomaly is that big in the history of the program.

Rogues don't behave like that. They prefer isolated locations, and if they're the daring type, they'll congregate in a metropolitan city, but we all know that's rare. They shit don't become neighbors. They're territorial than a damn hippo. GEORGIA: If it's that large of a search area, how on Earth did you find evidence, let alone a three dozen boxes-worth of files? WYOMING: Will you believe me if I said luck? No, probably not. And there's more in Room two and three.

The pile over here is just what I want to start with—the easy stuff. TEXAS: (inaudible grumbling) Holy shit. This might be a long night. GEORGIA: Eh. Try days. WYOMING: (continues) You two know me too well that I don't believe in such things—luck. I've had a few agents who worked with me in gathering all of these. Now I need help sorting this crap out and painting the full picture on what the heck we're dealing with. But our biggest clue is that these patterns started coming out of a little town called Point Hope.

Ever heard of it? TEXAS: Never heard of it. WYOMING: No, you wouldn't have. It's small quiet city in Oregon by the Cascades. By my last count, about sixty-three locals have gone missing or found deceased around the area. Folks vanish, some show up in the lake or the forest weeks later, dead or just… no prints. No trace. Sometimes… just gone.

(faint hum builds from recorder interference) If we extrapolate and include the States of Washington, Idaho, California, and Nevada from residents who crossed paths with Point Hope or the Selene Mountain… that's 357 people missing or have expired under suspicious circumstances. That includes the tourists who have gone missing from Germany, Sweden, the UK, China, Canada, Turkey, and South Korea. (pause) What caught our attention is the density.

We've had multiple Rogue reports within a three hundred-mile radius off this place, even sightings within Portland and as far as San Diego of the same Rogue with the same descriptions in the same day. Confirmed ones, not just reports from the cuckoos. TEAXAS: (snorts) Fuck off. How can a Rogue be sighted in two places at once? How's that possible? GEORGIA: Could be a new one we haven't discovered yet. WYOMING: That's why we're here to figure out. Not boring now, is it, Tex? TEXAS: (chair scrapes) Okay, you got me.

I admit, this is getting interesting. GEORGIA: (leans in, louder to the mic) You're saying there's a potential for a really big op? WYOMING: Maybe. Or something's calling them there. Who knows? GEORGIA: But you're gathering a case for Dr. Andrews and the Colonel, right? Is that what Captain Raffe has been prepping for these past few weeks? He pulled two members of my recon team from Palermo without an explanation. Two of my best guys. WYOMING: The how's and what's and why's are not your concern.

We are just compiling a report. TEXAS: Yeah, a big fucking book. So what's the priority here? I've got a team prepping in Santo Domingo for an outbreak near Las Charcas. We think it's a Class-Four anomaly. GEORGIA: That's pretty standard. Your guy can easily handle it. All we've got are Class-Fours and Fives these days. WYOMING: (sighs) The Inner Circle thinks this will be more important. (pause) Class-Two. (There's an audible shift in the room. One of them exhales sharply. The clock ticks louder in the background.) GEORGIA: (hesitant) Have we ever had an anomaly that low before? WYOMING: (long pause) In my forty years of service… no. This is a first. TEXAS: Not even the New Orleans Incident? WYOMING: Not even close. (Silence again. Someone's pen clicks. A faint scratch, as if the mic is picking up something faint from the wall—then it stops.) TEXAS: Shit. What makes this one different? WYOMING: For one, the Rogues are not behaving normally. They usually go for the kill. Always, right? Like the Rogue in the Himalayas?

TEXAS: Don't remind me, sir. I lost eight good men. WYOMING: Well, the confirmed Rogues in the anomaly behaves abnormally. They don't go for the kill. They prolong their hunting methods using different tactics and traits that are uncharacteristic of their kind. For what purpose… that stumps me. You'll read it for yourself. Maybe you'll get a different picture. I've been at this for months. GEORGIA: Is this coming from the Commander himself? WYOMING: (pause) That's above your clearance, Georgia.

What matters is this: the Inner Circle wants everything catalogued—every incident, every missing person, every false lead. There's something growing in that region, and no matter how small or how "out there" it is, I want to know about it. (papers rustle, faint static) The Commander said— (cuts himself off) —okay, look. I'm not gonna put kid gloves on both of you for this. You know the protocols. You two are not green at this. You know what to do. just… be vigilant. Start with the Point Hope reports.

You'll see what I mean. (brief silence) GEORGIA: (softly) Sir… what exactly are we looking for? WYOMING: (after a long pause) Patterns. And if we're lucky… the enemy. [Audio distortion–indecipherable–end of file.] CASE FILE C39B: TRUTHGUM ROCKS (Excerpt from a YouTube video uploaded to the channel TruthGum Rocks. Video removed for community guideline violations. Recovered via web archive.) Agent Notes (from an unnamed Institute Agent) about the creator: Joshua "Josh" McNear (b. April 16, 1990) was a 34-year-old self-styled master investigator and conspiracy theorist residing in Salem, Oregon. Unemployed since 2021, Joshua lived with his parents in a two-story ranch house on the outskirts of the city. His father, Kenneth McNear, is a general warehouse manager for an agricultural distributor, and his mother, Martha, teaches English at a local middle school. The family is known locally. Joshua was regarded as the odd one out.

While his brother Ethan works for a San Francisco tech firm and his sister Kendra Grimmett lives comfortably as a housewife in Portland with her husband and two daughters, Joshua never quite found his footing. He drifted through a string of short-term jobs—auto repair, video store clerk, airport maintenance—before settling into what he called his "true calling." This story is posted elsewhere by the author. Help them out by reading the authentic version. Joshua ran his YouTube channel, TruthGum Rocks, since 2017.

Despite a modest following of around five thousand subscribers, his uploads have generated small pockets of online buzz on Reddit for their bizarre, yet harmlessly absurd content. The contents below are one of the last footage of Joshua McNear. The video begins with the sound of rushing air, wind slapping against the microphone. The camera trembles slightly, capturing an aerial view of dense pine forest stretching endlessly beneath an overcast sky.

A text overlay appears:"TruthGum Investigations: The McLaren Dragon — Dragon Hunting (Part 1)" Uploaded: May 29 th, 2024. Duration: 14 minutes, 36 seconds. Behind the camera, Joshua narrates in his typical fast, excitable voice. JOSHUA (off-camera): Alright folks, here we go. TruthGum Flight 001. I'm over McLaren Forest, heading northeast. That ridge up there—yep, that's the beautiful Selene Mountain, one of the prides and joys of the state, and right on the other side is Point Hope.

There's that one store there that makes really good baklava. Delish. Anyway, If you've seen my last video, you already know what I'm after. The McLaren Dragon. Yeah, that's right. I'm going dragon hunting, baby! (camera pans left, revealing the wide blue expanse of North Cedar Lake glinting through the mist) Agent Notes: Joshua has been flying since he was seventeen.

The plane he was operating in the video, a restored Cessna 206 Turbo-Prop, he repaired and rebuilt himself over four years, piecing it together from old parts scavenged off eBay and a dismantled sky-tour company in Bend. JOSHUA: To the unbelievers who called me some fucked-up names and doubted me about what I saw, well, I'm getting video proof of that dragon from where it lives, that's right, here in the deep wilderness of Oregon. Don't know what to call it yet, but McLaren Dragon sounds nice.

I saw one fan commented on my last video that I should name it American Dragon, because, yeah, just like there's an American Eagle, America now has an American Dragon. (laughs) You hear that, Coop? Whatcha think of American Dragon? COOPER: Cacaw! JOSHUA: No! That's an eagle, dumb nuts. COOPER: Oh. Rawr. (the camera jolts as turbulence rocks the aircraft; faint laughter is heard) Agent Notes: The voice that replies belongs to his longtime friend and frequent co-host, Cooper Hettle, age 35.

Cooper works part-time at an auto body shop in Salem and has appeared in numerous TruthGum episodes, usually serving as someone who agrees or confirms his claims, and to give it a semblance of legitimacy. COOPER (off-camera): You sure this is legal, man? We're skimming pretty low. JOSHUA: (laughs) Yeah, yeah we're good. Um, to those who are just watching or haven't seen my last video, go check that video out now. If not, well, don't worry, because I'll give you the good special Joshie recap. (Adjusts his buckle. Clears his throat) Picture this: It was April 20 th. I had my usual early morning flight just joyriding the skies. You know. The usual. Thought it was fog rolling over the ridge, until it moved. It got these huge beating wings. Long but massive body. Like—like a shadow breaking out the clouds and whoosh! It flew over my fucking plane! Claws bigger than my freaking head! That's when I realized that dragons are fucking real, ya'll! Big foot's old news now.

There's a new bitch in town, and it lives here in Oregon, in these mountains. (camera zooms toward the jagged peak of Selene Mountain, snow still clinging to its upper slope) COOPER: You sure it wasn't like a plane? Like a passenger plane? Or like a guy parachuting down from another plane? JOSHUA: I know what I saw, Coop. I saw a dragon. Ain't nobody parachuting early in the morning. (Cooper laughs again, uneasy but humoring him) COOPER: Or maybe it's Superman.

Agent Notes: Joshua and Cooper flies over the area four more times separated into four videos hunting for the McLaren Dragon. These videos are uploaded every Wednesday throughout May. Another video shows them hiking through the McLaren Forest entering the Point Hope Anomaly. They come out without any evidence of this supposed McLaren Dragon. That changes on June 3 rd, 2024. What you are about to read is a transcript of the unreleased footage from Joshua McNear's laptop.

The video file was scheduled to upload the next day, June 4 th, 2024, with the title: THE DRAGON IS REAL. PROOF!!! The upload was never completed. Recovered Footage Log — "THE DRAGON IS REAL. PROOF!!!" Handheld footage inside a small Cessna cockpit. Outside the window: solid gray. Thick fog swallowing everything beyond ten feet. COOPER: You can't even see the ground, Josh. Let's turn back. JOSHUA: No. No, this is it — this might be it, Coop. The fog rolled in just like this the first time I saw it.

COOPER: You're not even sure it exists, man. Static cuts in. The camera shakes as turbulence hits. JOSHUA: Hold steady, hold steady— COOPER: You're gonna get us killed— The plane dips sharply. Cooper yelps. The fog outside ripples like waves underwater. The fog thickens. The camera lens tries to focus, struggling with the brightness balance. A faint, dark outline passes to their left—massive, slow. COOPER (panicking): What the hell was that—what was that, Josh? JOSHUA: (shouting) Do you see it?!

Holy shit—I told you! I told you it's real! Joshua tilts the plane to follow it. The camera swings wildly; the horizon becomes a never-ending sky. COOPER: What the fuck?! Stop—turn around—turn the hell around! There's a loud thump on the right wing. The camera jitters; the plane lurches. COOPER: Oh my God! (screams) JOSHUA: It touched us! It actually— The sound of metal creaking fills the cabin.

For half a second, something passes in front of the windshield—black, scaled texture glistening, almost translucent in the mist. Then gone. Audio cuts out completely. Only a faint high-pitched tone. Then the video stutters. The plane steadies. The fog begins to clear. A glimpse of Cooper's face in panic. The footage abruptly skips. The screen is black for several seconds, just muffled voices. Then: the door of the Cessna slams open. The camera shakes violently before steadying. COOPER (off-camera): I'm done, Josh.

I mean it this time. I'm done. He storms past the camera. Behind him, the fog still lingers like a ghost over the Cascade Range beyond the horizon. JOSHUA (behind camera): Cooper, come on, man, just—just wait, okay? We got something this time. I saw it. You saw it. It's real. I've told you for weeks. It's real. COOPER: All I saw was fog and something. But what's worse is that you played kamikaze in the clouds! You almost got us killed! What were you thinking? What if we hit that thing?

JOSHUA: First of all, that thing flew to us and hit the plane! Not me. You said it yourself, you saw it. You can't fake that. That wasn't a bird or an airplane, Coop— COOPER: I used to think this was fun. We'd get drunk, make spooky videos, get ten thousand views and laugh about it. But now… man. I don't know what the fuck that was, Josh, but you gotta stop before you get hurt. We shouldn't go back there. JOSHUA: What's all this pussy shit? COOPER: I'm serious, Josh. JOSHUA: Look.

All I'm asking is we fly back up there and get some good footage. Some of the footage got corrupted. COOPER: I'm not dying for your proof, man! JOSHUA: You're walking away from history, Coop. You think I'm doing this for clicks? For a paycheck? Sure, We'll get rich! But we have to show the world first. This is some life changing stuff, man! COOPER: No. You're doing it because you've got nothing left.

You sleep in the same room you've been in for 34 years, your dad won't even talk to you about this stuff anymore, and your brother won't answer your calls. Your other friends stopped showing up. You need this thing to be real because if it's not, then what the hell are you even doing with your life? Joshua lowers the camera for a moment. His breathing grows heavy. JOSHUA: (hoarse) Then why are you here then? COOPER: Because I'm your friend! I'm all you have left. Let's go back home.

JOSHUA: (scoffs) I don't need you. You know what? I let you join my channel because I feel pity for you since your fiancé dumped you. I'm alright solo. (pauses) I'm doing fine solo. COOPER: Fuck you, Josh. JOSHUA (shouting after him): You'll regret this! When people finally see it, when they see the truth, you'll wish you stayed! You're not gonna get a cent! COOPER (over his shoulder): Then you can tell 'em I was smart enough to leave before shit hits the fan. The car door slams. The headlights flare.

The SUV reverses, turns down the gravel road, vanishing into the fog. Joshua keeps filming for another twenty seconds. The wind howls against the microphone. JOSHUA: (whispers) He's gonna turn around. He's gonna turn around. This is the last conversation between Joshua McNear and Cooper Hettle. Footage resumes abruptly. Timestamp reads 02: 47 PM, June 4 th, 2024. The plane door opens. Joshua's voice mutters to himself, carrying the camera as he climbs in. JOSHUA (muttering): Just one more look… one more pass.

I'm gonna show them. Just you wait. The footage distorts — the frame collapses into digital static, pixels bleeding into black. [INSTITUTE ARCHIVAL REPORT – CLASSIFIED] File Reference: CASE FILE C39B – Subject: McNear, Joshua Date Compiled: May 18th, 2025 Prepared by: Handler Georgia (Assisting), reviewed by Handler Wyoming Status: OPEN Summary: On June 5th, 2024, local emergency services recovered the remains of Joshua McNear, age thirty-four, from the surface of North Cedar Lake, near Wizard Island.

McNear's personal aircraft, a restored Cessna 206 turbo-prop, was located submerged approximately one hundred and thirty feet below the lake's northern inlet. The aircraft's transponder registered no distress signal, no emergency beacon, and no flight communication within the final twelve minutes of flight time. Witnesses at the Lusardi Airfield confirm that McNear departed alone at 03: 17 PM PST, despite heavy fog advisories issued that day.

At 05: 03 PM, seismic and atmospheric sensors in the McLaren Forest region registered a brief energy distortion, lasting less than two seconds, followed by a faint signature detected by the Department of Forestry's thermal monitoring system. At 05: 08 PM, the Cessna disappeared from radar completely. Divers with the NTSB and Oregon State Police located the aircraft on June 6th, though the fuselage showed no evidence of an onboard explosion or mechanical failure.

Inside the cockpit, they found the following: One handheld Sony 4K action camera, SD card partially melted. A burned pilot seat, consistent with localized thermal exposure. A charred human body. No traces of aviation fuel ignition inside the cabin. Both windows shattered outward. Forensic testing confirmed McNear's cause of death as thermal trauma consistent with self-immolation. However, no accelerants were found, a detail currently omitted from public records. No secondary remains were recovered.

I have attached the joint statement from the FBI and the NTSB: Official Statement (FBI / NTSB Joint):"Following a comprehensive investigation into the June 5th fatal crash of a Cessna 206 aircraft registered to Joshua McNear, both the NTSB and the FBI have concluded that the incident was not the result of mechanical failure, weather interference, or external tampering. Forensic evidence indicates that the fire responsible for Mr. McNear's death was the result of self-immolation.

In accordance with the available evidence, the event has been officially classified as a suicide. There is no evidence of foul play. The case is hereby closed pending new evidence." — Filed statement from July 11 th, 2024 Agent Notes (Handler Wyoming): (handwritten on attached page)"Not a suicide? No. Couple things I've noticed. The plane didn't burn from the outside. Just him and the cockpit. Nothing left but the camera. Unrecoverable footage, unfortunately. Entity-influenced? Which Rogue?" — W.

CASE FILE A90E: MISSING POSTERS"A Photograph of the Missing" Location: North Cedar Ranger Station, McLaren Forest, Oregon Captured by: Ranger Deputy Harold Wittner, April 2025 The image shows a large corkboard mounted on a faded green wall inside the North Cedar Ranger Station's public information area. The board measures roughly eight feet across. The board is covered edge-to-edge with missing person flyers, obituaries, and local news clippings.

Overlaps of curling paper and rusted thumbtacks layer the surface like scales, showing a collage of the Anomaly's possible victims. Centered on the board is a flyer showing a smiling woman in her twenties, wearing hiking gear. The headline reads:"MISSING: KALEY TAYLOR, AGE 22, LAST SEEN MARCH 21ST, 2025 – SELENE TRAILHEAD." Someone has circled the date in red ink, twice. To her right: a man in his fifties with a pot belly holding a fishing pole by a lake. The edges of his flyer are rain-stained.

A note lists a number on who to call if there's information of his whereabouts:"MISSING: STEVEN COYLE, AGE 52, LAST SEEN JULY 27, 2024 - NORTH CEDAR LAKE" Below them, a family photo of middle-aged parents and their two teenage son and daughter at a campsite, smiling over a picnic table. Their flyer is older, the paper sun-bleached and curling at the corners. A ranger's note in fine print: "Case transferred to Deschutes County. Presumed dead."

Near the bottom, an older black-and-white newspaper clipping:"FOUR SWEDISH TOURISTS VANISHED NEAR ANICHO FALLS – DEC 2024." Another news clipping is posted right next to it, reads:"PRISON BUS CRASH KILLS 17, EIGHT STILL MISSING - AUG 2024" Forensic Notes: When the photograph's metadata was examined, a secondary light source was detected in the reflection of the Ranger Station window on the left corner of the picture—a faint humanoid silhouette standing behind the photographer, partially obscured by the glare.

No such figure was visible at the time of capture.