The following account was recorded in the agent's log during your transmission: A massive stone statue of the Lamassu, the ancient Mesopotamian guardian deity, stands guard over a desert oil field, uh, like some surreal mirage. The air's heavy with the smell of petroleum and sand, the dry heat radiating up from the dunes like a blast furnace. Old, abandoned oil rigs, some still pumping away like zombies, stretch out to the horizon under a pale, blue-gray sky, their steel beams somehow entwined with snaking, ethereal tendrils of iridescent St. Elmo's Fire. The stillness is oppressive, broken only by the creaking of old machinery.