TRANSCRIPTION OF AUDIO
DOCUMENT CONFISCATED FROM
Dr. Jordan Johnson

Madness.

I watch scientists haul a dinosaur carcass from a cave in the Nevada desert. The sun has almost set, and for the last 24 hours it felt like this moment might have never come. I find myself walking backward. Feels like I've been doing it all day. Walking backward.

The carcass looks limp and ancient under the gurney straps. The head of the animal withered on the neck, great puckering crater between its black, glassy eyes. Like a shark. A few steps back and the black eyes are getting smaller. Conversations in the crowd charged with the triumph of scientific discovery. People saying things like "This changes everything!" and "We've got to get a bigger team down there as soon as possible."

Helicopter descending, blowing sand everywhere like a storm, hits your skin like sandpaper. Dry heat in the air neutralizing, chill of the desert at night setting in. Still a dull tint of light in the sky, hazy grayish blue, fading to black. A few more steps, and I'm hearing the police argue with their superiors. The chief is endlessly glued to the phone, bad look in his eye, severe apprehension. I keep walking backward while everything in me is screaming, "Run."

A few steps further back and the tidal wave of people crests into a filmy, low tide mucus of the news media. A dozen cameras and a dozen journalists all talking over one another in one dissonant vibration that tells the people everywhere, all over the world, be very afraid.

A man with his finger to his ear, some electronic device inside speaking to him, whips around to face the cave because of the screaming. We both heard screaming. In another second, everyone hears the screaming, and while they're calling out, "Get the camera! Start rolling! Let's go!" I'm still walking backward.

The commotion begins infecting the entire area. Policemen arming themselves and charging toward the source of all the commotion, scientists calling for the police to stand down. What I feel is like a calm before the storm, like a moment of peace and clarity, and I stop walking backward. One foot in front of the other, I'm heading back into madness.

Moments ago, I was standing just feet from the animal's lifeless body. I passed slowly through a ring of cave divers, a ring of scientists, a ring of police officers and finally a ring of parasitic news reporters. Making the same trek in the other direction is a different story; the sands seem barren and empty, every single ring has been concentrated into one hectic cluster at the center of the activity where the gurney was lifted.

Before I reach the center, I can hear the people screaming, "It's alive! It's still alive!"