Log 01 - The Outbreak
This form has been filled in accordance with the Informative Template log, and has been peer-reviewed by a scribe agent and approved by a superior officer.
Log Entry: 01
Date: April 7th, 2046
Event: Cataclysmic Dimension Convergence - "The Outbreak"
Overview:
On April 7th, 2046, the USGS began receiving readings on simultaneous seismic events across the globe. Upon investigating reports sent by collaborators, the origins of these readings were confirmed to be occurring across the Pacific, Atlantic, and Indian Oceans. Given the lack of precedents for such widespread seismic activity, the USGS issued high-priority alerts to inform relevant authorities and the public of potential hazards.
Although the necessary efforts were directed, humanity was simply not prepared to deal with such an unprecedented disaster, as these seismic events were being caused by a "Dimensional Convergence", which would later be referred to as "The Outbreak", drastically reshaping human society, as well as the planet's geology and ecosystem.
Details of the Event:
The following transcription contains a singular report written by a Puerto Rican journalist, recorded during the early hours of "The Outbreak," as soldiers led him along the BR-050 federal highway from Santos to São Paulo.
At 05:23 UTC, electronic devices across multiple countries showed signs of interference as seismic activity and intense thunderstorms spread throughout the ocean, gradually approaching the continental shores.
At 06:12 UTC, seismic activity began affecting coastal cities, leading to power surges, disturbances in radio communications, and unnatural animal behavior, which alarmed the population and caused widespread panic.
At 06:45 UTC, multiple unidentified aquatic organisms appeared en masse in several large coastal cities, attacking civilians, animals, and buildings.
At 06:53 UTC, the military responded swiftly, taking over evacuation efforts and forming task forces to engage the unidentified organisms in an attempt to recover the cities and assist civilians still trying to escape.
At 07:46 UTC, heavy casualties were reported, prompting a shift in efforts toward evacuation, as the cities were deemed lost territory due to the organisms' unnatural resilience and much larger population.
At 09:34 UTC, the use of communication equipment was halted. Soldiers reported that the unidentified life forms were capable of "sensing" transmitted radio waves. Officers leading the evacuation efforts deemed them too dangerous, improvising with whistling patterns for communication instead.
Key Affected Areas:
- Pacific Rim: Major coastal cities in Asia, North America, and South America faced violent hordes of anomalies coming from the sea. Tokyo, Lázaro Cárdenas, San Francisco, Lima, Concepción, and Rio de Janeiro were among the hardest hit, with the total collapse of infrastructure in many regions.
- Atmospheric Impact: The dimensional convergence caused natural phenomena such as storms, earthquakes, and flooding to worsen for a period of time, leading to even more damage, while several unidentified organisms took to the skies.
- Human and Environmental Toll: An estimated 2.1 billion lives were lost due to the combined effects of the dimensional convergence, seismic activity, flooding, and the subsequent famine triggered by crop failure and supply chain disruptions. Many water sources were contaminated, leading to mass extinction events in several geographical regions.
Response or Recovery Efforts:
- Global Coordination: Emergency efforts were hampered by communication blackouts and the loss of satellite networks. However, surviving government bodies formed the Global Emergency Coalition (GEC), aimed at organizing relief, restoring infrastructure, and establishing sustainable food production in less affected regions. This effort would later pave the way for a formal establishment of the GEC as a permanent government body for territories being defended or recovered by military efforts across the world.
- Societal Adaptation: Scientific bodies proposed the development of training and research forces dedicated towards understanding and neutralizing the unidentified organisms that became part of daily life across the surviving settlements; research efforts were slow, with experts predicting it could take several decades for infrastructure and stability to allow for an effective counter-offensive against the anomalous entities humanity would now be facing.
Current Status:
The Outbreak as it became known left humanity and the planet in a fragile state, with nations living under strict rationing as widespread displacement led to a new era of global migration. Scientists continue to monitor the anomalies, using surviving factories to produce a controlled number of functioning rockets to restore communication satellites across the globe.
Researchers hoping to spearhead breakthroughs in defensive measures against anomalies develop useful tools capable of reading their presence to a limited extent, and as individuals begin manifesting unforeseen phenomena, tensions rise as survivors become violent or intolerant towards humans affected by anomalous effects.
On December 16th, 2046, the GEC and it's military forces were put on high alert due to a potential threat emerging above the North Atlantic and Celtic Sea borders; reports specified sightings of a strange dark obelisk slowly approaching Smerwick Harbour in Ireland.
This would be humanity's first contact with The Ward.
