Facility Two

Facility Two, also known as the Research Compound, was the base of operations of the Sovereign Colonies Armed Forces Science Division on Tau Volantis. It stood on a mountain peak, designated Mount Olympus, that hid the Alien Machine within, and it was from this compound that the SCAF drove a shaft down toward the buried Machine. The base was abandoned during the Scenario Five purge in 2314 and lay frozen and forgotten until Isaac Clarke and John Carver reached it two centuries later.

Layout and defenses#

Facility Two faced north and was located near a large cliffside at the top of the mountain that concealed the Alien Machine below. Outside the base, frozen alien-made Red Markers could be found across the surface, trapped inside the walls, in the ground, and even within the elevator shaft that ran between the research base and the Machine beneath it.

A thick wall surrounded the compound and protected it from the elements outside, with an additional wall and a built-in checkpoint set at the entrance of the silo leading down to the Machine. A lift system was built across the mountainside, running all the way down to Facility One at the base of the mountain. Every high-ranking officer carried a key that granted access to the entire facility. A labyrinth of corridors had been carved into the icy terrain riddled with Markers, with the entrance to the Paleontology Sector beside the compound gate and an overpass between the exterior entrance and the entrance to the Biology Sector.

The compound was divided into sections dedicated to different work. The most important was the Rosetta research facility within the Biology Sector, which also held Marker Containment. The Paleontology Sector contained the Reaper Barracks, the Geology Sector held Disposal Services, and the Research Compound Silo opened onto the Alien Machine itself. These spaces were used to study the extinct alien race, the dead alien-based Necromorphs, and the more recent variants that had appeared during the outbreak.

SCAF expedition#

By tracing the signals that the Nexus received, the SCAF researchers were able to pinpoint what they believed was the source of the Marker signals and the location of the Alien Machine beneath the mountain a short distance from Facility One. To investigate the Machine, they constructed the Research Compound atop the mountaintop and began digging a shaft to reach the buried structure. While the excavation proceeded, recovered frozen Necromorph samples were experimented on and studied, and an intact alien specimen designated Rosetta was examined to learn more about the aliens.

According to a recovered SCAF record, the initial fly-overs of the planet's surface had discovered an unusual mountain formation at the center of a jagged crater, the site that would prove to contain the Alien Machine. The personnel responsible reported sightings of snow-covered, nearly identical obelisks shaped as if two tendrils had intertwined, and during these fly-overs at least one member of the expedition began to experience the first stages of the Marker signal-induced dementia.

Scenario Five and abandonment#

As Scenario Five commenced in 2314, under General Spencer Mahad's orders the facility's halls were packed with all of the research papers, biological specimens and lab equipment that could be gathered, so that they could be incinerated. Dr. Earl Serrano managed to hide the Rosetta specimen from the cleanse order, then made his way underground to the Alien Machine to await the delivery of the Codex, which was being transported aboard a ship called The Mule.

The Mule crashed somewhere near the Research Compound, and Serrano dispatched Privates Tim Caufman and Samuel Ackerman to retrieve the device. Their mission failed. Sam was killed while descending to the facility, and Tim was executed by General Mahad, who then took his own life. The facility was left abandoned and the lift system cables were destroyed, trapping anyone still alive on the mountain above.

The events of 2514#

Two hundred years later, while trying to reach the source of the Marker signal, Isaac Clarke and John Carver scaled the cliffs to reach Facility Two, losing Jennifer Santos in the process. They arrived to investigate the Rosetta lab, which still held the alien specimen that had been experimented on so long before. Finding the specimen incomplete, the two scoured the compound for the missing pieces, assembled it, and created a new Codex. They were soon attacked by Unitologists from the Circle, and Jacob Arthur Danik acquired the Codex and descended the elevator shaft toward the Alien Machine, pursued by Isaac and Carver.