Oil Rig

From Martina Bernal, PIGSTY XO

Re: Oil Rig "Asgard" in Bohai Bay (+38.33 latitude, +118.19 longitude)

We recently received a coded communication from an XCOM agent, Xu Qiong, who was recently transferred from the oceanographic/meteorological research team to the military research division on the oil rig. The rig is owned jointly by the Chinese and North Korean governments and has ties to universities in each country; apparently the research team is under the auspices of Dr. Wei Yan, a respected ecological scientist, and he has approximately a dozen grad students under him. Xu Qiong is a good programmer and was hired to help design ocean current prediction algorithms for Dr. Yan. Prior to Xu's recent communication we only knew that the North Koreans were performing their own experiments elsewhere on the rig and their activities were under heavy guard.

Fortunately for us, a North Korean programmer came down with horrific food poisoning and had to be evacuated to a mainland hospital. Xu was the only person competent enough and with appropriate security clearance to take over for the sick programmer. There Xu found the North Koreans, under Colonel Park Jung-Hoon, were conducting tests on a new type of metal dubbed Neutronium by the research team. Xu has not actually seen the metal but reports it exists as a viscous amber liquid until subjected to a particular electrical charge at which point the metal sets into a very hard, but very light, form. He extrapolated this from the data he is debugging.

Neither the Chinese nor North Koreans are very forthcoming with information but we have gained some unclassified intelligence from the universities that claim the North Korean soldiers are there to protect the students from domestic Chinese terrorists who are violently opposed to Communism. There have been multiple attacks in the area and brutal crackdowns and martial law imposition in the past few months.

I suggest possible entry as a medical team (the soldiers know basic first aid but that is all) or environmental hazard crew (the oil drilling machinery is not active but was never properly cleaned and the well, though practically dry, is still leaking into the bay). Clandestine approach is also possible but the weather and ocean sensors on the rig are fairly stout and might make stealthy approaches more challenging but not impossible. As always, try to avoid civilian casualties and maintain our agent's cover where possible. We have plausible deniability for any...less discrete...actions by blaming Chinese terrorists if so required.

Finding out what this Neutronium is and what the North Koreans are developing should greatly help XCOM's efforts in weapon and armor development.

From Dr. Yokohama, Lead Researcher

I would love a sample, or more, of that Neutronium. Though the North Korean's research is probably horrible, I'm sure I can glean something useful from the mass of errors they call research data. Any hard drives or flash drives would be very handy. Do the North Koreans still use floppy disks?