Original subtitles

Um, this condition has gotten significantly worse

and I don't quite know what to do.

I'm, I'm absolutely at a loss,

and I'm reaching a point of desperation.

I cannot get out of here.

I get behind the wheel of my truck

that is attached to this camper,

and I try to drive away and I don't know how to drive.

I don't know how to move the vehicle.

I don't know the symbols,

I don't... I literally stare at it

like, I have no idea how to use this truck.

It is as if my brain is a hard drive

and something has gone through

and removed the apps of communication and contact,

but left everything else the same.

I have no idea how I got here and how to get out of here.

Whatever this is, whatever's going on here,

I, I don't it doesn't hurt,

but it obviously is directly related to the fact that I've,

um,

I've...

I've lost my mind.

So I was searching around this trailer today,

I came across a, a storage compartment inside of it.

It had all these, they're like media drives.

They're like,

uh, things you would hook up to a camera or a video system

and they all have names on them.

This one says Mount Shasta,

this one says Charlie, and there's a bunch of them.

I think I can remember how to hook up some of these cameras,

and I'm thinking maybe they could

offer some kind of explanation.

Maybe they give me some kind of help to get out of here.

I don't know.

I gotta get out of here.

I don't know, I'm gonna try it.

So the other reason I really like this light is because you

can adjust the colour temperatures right here.

But the best thing is it runs off a battery pack

so that you can use it as a lighting source,

but you can also use it as a lantern,

which sometimes...

maybe I should turn off my phone before I start taping.

Kate, you call me more now than when you were married to me.

Hello?

Yeah. Hey, what's up?

Um, yeah, I'm around tomorrow.

What's going on?

Trip down memory...

What kind of trip down memory lane?

Yeah, all right, I'm around all day tomorrow.

Um. Yeah.

Stop by the house.

Okay. Bye.

All right.

Turn, turn off your fucking phone, Devin.

All right, let's do this again.

And yet, the quality,

This shoots 4K just as well as this canon,

and it's about half the size.

Hello? Hey, come in.

Yeah.

- Oh wow, what do you got going on here?

You got a lot of stuff.

- Yeah, well, I'm doing a, um...

You know, I, I, you know how much I love videography

and stuff like that.

So now I'm doing some posts...

I'm posting stuff on social media

comparing like, cameras.

So people who go hiking and you know, it's...

now I've got some time on my hands,

- Yeah. - so I'm doing it, so.

- Keeping yourself busy, well...

- Yeah, it's cool, how are you doing?

- I'm good, I'm good.

I just wanted to stop by and drop something off for you, uh.

- What is this?

- Okay, so Charlie gave me this box of tapes.

- Charlie?

- Charlie did, yeah.

And he asked me to hang on to them

and give them to you once you were retired.

I have no idea why.

- Dude, these are...

- Look at these.

- This is, like, back when we were in school together.

- I know, I didn't give them much thought

because you know Charlie.

- Have you looked at them?

- I haven't, no, no, I...

- Do you want to look at them?

- No. I'm pretty good with leaving the past in the past.

I, I, God love Charlie, but, uh, whatever they are

I probably wouldn't understand it anyway.

- Wow, this is really cool.

Maybe I'll do a video about this.

- Yes, yes you should.

- You should. - Really bizarre.

Um, well, thank you for bringing them by,

- Yeah, no problem. - Do you want to...

- Do you want some more coffee or something?

- No, no, I'm good, I gotta run.

I just, uh, hope you don't mind me just crashing your party.

But I just wanted to...

- Listen, I appreciate you coming by.

- It's really good to see you. - No problem.

- If there's some interesting stuff on here,

I think I may digitise these tapes.

That way I can bring them into the editing system

and have more control over it.

I know it's not necessarily the best system to digitise,

but maybe at least offer some clues as to why

these tapes were left for me in the first place.

- I heard from a few people today,

so the word's already spreading,

that you totally freaked the fuck out in class

and scared the shit out of everyone.

Scared the shit out of your professor.

What? - And...

Wait, what did you do?

- What happened, man?

Wait, wait, wait, wait.

Yeah. What did you do?

- There's just so much fucking lying going on in these classes.

I asked... I was in my anthropology class

and I asked my professor about it,

I asked a question about the Silurian theory.

The what?

- And he just kind of blew right past it,

just dismissed it as fucking nonsense.

Wait. - It just...

it pissed me off, so I got...

Yeah, I got in his face.

The what theory?

- So, you got so upset about...

what is this, the salvia theory?

The Saliva. - The Saliva theory?

It's the Saliva theory.

- It's the Silurian theory, dumbass.

It's basically...

it's this theory that says our evolution was basically

tied to another advanced or intelligent species

- Like aliens?

Is that what you're saying?

- Yeah, I mean, maybe, or,

you know, another species kind of like us, intelligent,

that evolved and then died out millions of years ago.

- Kind of fucking crazy.

Yeah, dude, you're on a scholarship, bro.

What are you...

- Let's do some math.

Let's take fucking...

Let's take dinosaurs as an example.

So.

- T-Rex.

There were about 20,000 of them at any given point,

and they were around for about 2.5 million years.

So 120,000, some odd generations, 2.5 billion total.

- Ever? - Yeah, ever.

Out of that, you know how many we've found?

What do you mean, like, like fossils and museums and stuff?

- Yeah.

- All time, that we found?

- You know how many?

- 5000?

Yeah, a thousand? - A thousand?

Easily a thousand.

- Right? Easy.

- Less than 50.

What?

- Bullshit. I call bullshit.

- That's a fact. - For real?

Is that a real stat?

- Less than 50.

There's another species kind of like us,

however many millions of years ago.

It's pretty safe to assume that there'd be no evidence of them.

Just like there's been...

There's going to be no evidence of us.

No cars, no skyscrapers, no plastics, no bones.

I think it's an interesting idea

as a thought experiment, Charlie, um, I do,

but I don't think you can apply real science to this stuff.

- Real science? - You know what I mean?

Why isn't this fucking real science?

- Because it's not in our textbooks.

- No, listen, this is the problem

with our fucking education.

It assumes that our evolution had something to do

with some kind of divine, superior intelligence.

It kind of moved us along like that.

Like, like we were chosen.

It's like, it's kind of like my dad used to say, you know,

we were talking about our church,

just that you don't have to worship a God,

you can worship another kind of higher consciousness.

Wait, wait, was this the church in the mountain?

- Yeah.

Yeah.

- I don't know, man.

Yeah, I'm done.

- You're acting a little weird.

I'm done.

Hey. Thank you for coming over.

Do you mind if I film you?

- Oh.

I know, I know, it's... come on in.

Let me explain.

- Do I need to do a little pose?

Uh, no.

Okay, so this has everything to do with

those, uh, tapes you brought over the other day.

So I'm...

I have a couple of questions for you,

but I'm filming everything now,

because of some of the stuff

I've been discovering on these tapes.

So do you mind if I just ask you a couple of questions on camera?

- Um, okay.

Okay, cool, thanks,

let's, let's go in the other room.

Do you remember Charlie used to

talk about this church all the time.

- Oh, yeah. - Do you remember

what that was called?

- Oh my gosh, yes.

The, uh, The church of heaven's light.

Heaven's light?

- Remember? He would not shut up about it.

Yeah, he was obsessed with that.

- Wow do you think that that something with the church

had something to do with why he killed himself.

I don't know. I don't know.

I mean, well, you know, I think the whole church thing

was him processing what happened to his dad.

- That's what I always thought.

Yeah, so...

- I didn't think much of the church one way or the other,

I just thought it was...

I didn't think it was real.

- I didn't either.

Yeah. so, okay, well, this is, this is helpful.

So what I'm thinking is, could I show you...

Would you be okay if I showed you a couple of these clips

- Yeah. - that I've come across?

Because I just wanna...

Maybe it'll jog something in your memory,

or maybe you'd be like, oh, yeah, no, I remember that part.

And maybe I'm just simply forgetting.

- Yeah, I'm happy to look at it.

I'm curious to look at the tapes now.

It's not good at all.

I have three essays, all due on Wednesday.

- You got to get your boyfriend to ease back a little bit,

but, it's still...

he's just talking on and on.

- God, will you please go easy on him?

I mean, we only have two more weeks and then we're free.

Speaking of which,

are we still going up to the mountain next month.

- Oh, dude, I can't wait.

Are you sure? Being up there?

- Yes, mom.

I'll be fine, thanks.

Here, let me see that.

Okay. I mean, I just worry, that's all.

You don't got to worry.

I love it when we go up there.

Plus, it's God's country.

- Oh my God! Stop! You dick!

- What are we talking over here, guys?

You guys talking about constellations?

- Yeah.

Yeah, I don't...

- Yeah, I couldn't find them.

- Yeah, I know, like I know the dippers,

the big and the little ones,

but yeah, I think whoever came up with the other ones

was probably really bored.

- Or really baked.

- What about the black and white?

Like, what was that?

I don't know, and that's what I'm trying to figure out.

- That's down on that, that, that land.

I recognise the land,

but the shipping container thing.

Yeah, I don't know.

- And who was the guy?

- Again, I don't know.

- Ooh, dude, that's creepy.

Yeah. Okay, well, good, I'm just glad I'm not crazy.

- No, I don't remember any of that.

You should get down there and figure out what that is.

- Good God, they're huge.

Okay, uh, whoo.

I am way the hell up here.

Just to let you know, I'm we're, um, yeah,

way up here and kind of in the middle of nowhere

and going higher.

So I'm not quite sure what is going to happen with the signal,

so I just wanted to make you a quick video.

Um, yeah, I think it's going to be pretty cool.

Don't be jealous of this look.

Hey there, my name is Devin Adams.

I'm a retired doctor of visual studies

from the University of Southern California.

Should we keep going?

Okay, let's go to a bar.

There she goes.

I'm out here in the Cuyamaca Mountains.

They are 20/25 minutes northeast of Mexico.

I'm up here because of a certain series of events

that took place,

starting with the death of a very, very dear friend of mine

by the name of Charles Anker.

Charlie was a brilliant guy, we were really close.

We met, we were roommates in college.

In fact, my ex-wife and I met him when we were sophomores,

and we were quite the trio.

We'd come up here sometimes, actually,

because my wife and I thought it might be

therapeutic for Charlie,

given what happened to him in his childhood.

I know this might seem hard to believe, but Charlie,

when he was ten years old,

was discovered walking in these mountains alone

by some weekend campers,

and they immediately swept him up.

He told the authorities that he was on a camping trip

with his church congregation and his father,

and so they immediately sent out a search party.

And the only thing they found, unfortunately,

was Charlie's father,

who had fallen off one of these massive boulders

while hiking and had broken his neck.

Unfortunately,

Charlie never really knew his mother,

so he ended up going into foster care.

But, you know, like I said, he was a really tough kid.

He was really brilliant, very book smart,

and he earned himself a scholarship.

He was pretty resilient.

But as with most relationships,

as you get older, they start to fade,

and my connections with Charlie became pretty distant.

These things are incredible,

especially when you've got this kind of scenery.

It's extraordinary.

She doesn't care for the drone, but, um,

it really is cool because you get this footage

and then I'll just kind of put music to it

and I'll just throw it in the timeline.

You know, the editing system that I'm working on.

Okay,

here we go.

You gonna get her?

You don't like it, do you?

But you gonna get it?

Okay. All right, here we go, ready?

Here it goes.

Pretty cool, huh?

You're like, fuck that thing.

Okay, I thought I'd show you guys this.

Uh, this is one of the perks of

retirement.

Yeah, I thought I would bring this sucker up here.

Put it on a trailer and brought it up a few days ago.

I thought it might help in the search.

Get into some really tight spaces,

but it's also super fun.

And there's always something I've wanted to do.

Total mad Max.

Whoa!

Come on, man!

Okay, so I've been cruising all over the place with this sucker,

and, um,

just came across something pretty interesting.

Ta da!

I have no clue.

It just doesn't...

Looks in great shape.

Which is impossible

given the fact that it's at least 30 years old.

I don't know.

This just doesn't make any sense.

It's...

it's all...

it's locked on the front, on both sides.

It's got a padlock on it.

I don't, I don't get it.

I don't get it.

I'm confused even more now.

None of this makes any fucking sense.

Okay. Welcome to the incredibly spacious camper.

It's all of 15ft,

but it's...

will definitely protect me from whatever is out there.

This is a trail cam.

These are some high quality trail cams

that shoot its signal up to the cloud.

And I'm going to take two of these

and place them on opposite sides of the conex,

the shipping container.

I just want to see what kind of traffic

is potentially either coming in and out of that thing

or what might be just around it.

So I'm going to put these out tonight and, um, we'll see.

Uh, go back in a couple days and take a look.

But...

yeah, we'll see what we see.

Okay, so that freaked me the fuck out.

Uh, I'm not quite sure what's going on here,

but whoever, whatever it was that grabbed that,

my trail cam has now brought it

into the shipping container with them,

and they are filming themselves inside the conex.

I reached out to a friend of mine named Malcolm Owens.

He's in the anthropology department

at University of Wisconsin,

and he, I asked him if he'd be willing to do a Zoom with me,

because I wanted to ask him specifically

about this dysmorphia.

As well as I noticed, this was really interesting,

at the end of that footage,

as close as I could tell,

it looked like that individual was either reading a notebook

or holding a notebook in his hand.

- The other option would be, you know, quite frankly,

whether or not it has become a cultural aspect

of removing the nose for ceremonial reasons

or for hygienic reasons,

or for just outward appearance ideas.

Or is this something that they

outwardly disfigure themselves on purpose

as part of a cultural ritual

that might have some bearing on where they're at

and what, what they're doing.

- I, it's interesting, uh,

honestly, Malcolm, I hadn't thought of that.

I hadn't thought of the idea that they had,

this was almost like a self-mutilation.

Maybe this is a cultural thing they're doing.

- I think I would lean more towards the cultural aspect,

um, or a ceremonial aspect.

Did you see it?

Was your interpretation of the image

that he was reading this notebook?

- I, you know, I don't want to go so far as to

anthropomorphise a a particular act.

Is this a piece of artwork?

Is this, you know, a writing sample?

Is this a, a song?

I don't know.

- Archer. Hey, oh, my God, you accepted the invite.

Thank you so much.

How are you? What's going on?

How's SC?

- I'm good, Dr Adams,

it's so great to hear from you.

To see you.

Um, SC is great.

I graduate the program soon.

Christmas around that time.

So that's cool.

- That's amazing, Archer, I'm so proud of you.

What? You're getting your degree in criminology now,

is that right?

- Yeah, yeah,

I actually, I, I might even have a line-up job for me

if you...

Did you get that email about the letter of recommendation?

- I did.

- Yeah, yeah. I really, really need it.

So if you can do it soon.

- I will, and I'm going to write something up when I get back.

Um, listen, I know we need to do a full sit down and a catch up.

I mean, it's been a little while, so,

but I don't have a lot of time up...

I'm, I'm kind of up here and the internet is spotty.

- Where are you?

- I'm up in the, uh, the Cuyamaca Mountains.

They're just east of, actually, San Diego in the city.

I'm doing a favour for an old friend,

um, and it's a long story,

and I'll kind of share it with you

when I've got a little more time.

So listen, this, this community that I'm searching for is,

it was known as the Church of Heaven's Light.

So have you ever heard of something like that?

I, I, I'm just kind of curious,

in your research over the years.

- Is it a commune or an actual church?

- You know, honestly, Archer, I don't know.

Um, I, my understanding is that it was a spiritual community

that was living up here in the mountains, kind of off grid,

like living a primitive lifestyle.

Um, so that's kind of all I know.

- I can ask some of my friends, we can scour the net.

I have some weird sites bookmarked,

so that would definitely come in handy.

I'll just write down your notes here.

- I came across a conex the other day

and you know, a conex is like a shipping container.

It's huge, like 40 foot, 40 foot shipping container.

And it was in this really good shape,

but, but I think, I think people are using it as a shelter.

- Devin, if people are up in the mountains by themselves,

I'm pretty sure they don't want to be bothered.

Okay? And if they're in shipping containers,

that means that they're moving around a lot.

- Yeah. - Be careful.

I don't think you should be up there by yourself.

- Okay. All right.

Um. Uh.

Shit. You know what?

You've gone frozen.

You know? Archer, are you still there?

- Devin, did you hear what I said about calling backup?

- Uh, Archer, are you there?

- Doctor Adams?

don't forget about the letter of recommendation

if you can hear me.

- Okay. It's dusk here,

and I've been tooling around on this side-by-side,

and I was gonna head back to camp,

but I thought I would do one more drive-by

on the shipping container

just to see if anything was going on.

And, uh, the...

The door, the door is open.

And I come rumbling up here on this fucking side-by-side,

but I can't hear anything.

I have no video equipment aside from this, uh, body cam,

but I feel like I'm here.

The door is open, I should go in.

Yeah.

Hopefully, I can catch...

I don't know what's in here.

Hello?

Hello? Anybody there?

Anybody home?

What the fuck?

That's a candle.

That is a lit candle.

Hey, hello? Anybody home?

I think those are the notebooks

that I saw in the trail cam footage.

I want to see what's in those.

I want to see what's in those notebooks.

Hello? Anybody home?

What is this?

It looks like math.

Hello?

Hello. I just...

Hello.

So, listen, first of all, Sean,

I want you to know how much I really appreciate

you doing this for me.

I don't know what to think about these notebooks.

- The notebooks are very weird, and they look like gibberish,

but if you start to analyse them, then you get some...

you see some math at a staggeringly high level,

and it's, like, it seems like a mess at first,

and I was almost like, Devin, what have you done to me?

But then I got into it and there was some great,

fascinating material here, extraordinary math in there.

The most compelling thing we found

was what looks like

there are four different sets of coordinates

and they're pointing to four different places on the planet.

The vortexes that they refer to,

one is in Sedona, Arizona.

One is Mount Shasta, California.

The third is a location in Zion National Park in Utah.

And the strangest of all

are the coordin a tes for this location

that's just north of us here.

And that is Viroqua in Wisconsin.

- Is there a language going on here amidst all this?

- Okay, so we applied this old school method,

the Tamario method,

and I had some graduate students work with me on this.

And it turns out that some of the long numbers,

like you can basically translate them into another language,

and in this case, we found parallels,

like we could sort of de-encrypt it into German in some places,

and we transferred that to English,

and we came up with some pretty cryptic shit,

I got to say.

Now, this is a very loose translation.

I'm sure you're going to want to run this by a linguist.

But this is what we came up with

for one of the, one of the passages.

we've got, quote, prepare for heaven's light.

You don't need eyes to see your Saviour.

Now, there was some debate about

whether we should use this term Saviour,

but for this translation, let's go with it.

Forget the mind to find your faith.

The faithless will suffer forever.

End quote.

Now what the hell is going on there?

- Holy shit, you're really sure?

This is what these numbers translate to?

- It's almost like... - Yes.

- Scripture.

- It feels very scriptural to, to, to us over here in the lab.

- Okay, so I'm at the shipping container.

I'm going to give it a shot.

I'm going to try to open the door.

I've got my video camera here.

I've got my body cam on.

I'm going to put this down here.

- Devin, Archer here.

So I did try to do some research on Heaven's Light.

Didn't find much.

However, I did come across a file that was documented

by a woman named Gina Globe.

So it says here that she was a topographical mapper

for the Bureau of Land Management

in San Diego County.

And around eight years ago, she claims she came across

a shipping container while documenting some acreage

in the Cuyumacas.

In a file, she claimed that the conex was in pristine condition

and there was no record of its location filed with the county.

The report says that she discovered several people

living in primitive conditions inside the container.

So there was a contact number for Gina

and I decided to call her.

I don't know why, I had to call six times,

but anyways, when I did finally reach her,

she denied the entire report.

I don't want to say that she was lying,

but you could tell that she was hiding something.

Or as if she was afraid to say something.

I don't know, maybe I'm looking into it way too much,

but just give me a call back when you can.

- Hey, Devin, it's Kate.

Uh, I'm just checking to see if you're back in the city yet.

I have something that I found

that I think you find pretty interesting.

So give me a call when you have a second.

I'd love to swing by and see you,

um, and let's have a chat.

- Hi. - Hey.

Uh, well, come on in.

- It's not my house any more.

Yeah. - Sorry.

That's okay.

Wait, wait, wait, wait, what's going on?

- You've got your camera going.

Yes, I do.

- You're not going to believe this.

Um, so what do I start?

Okay, so right after our divorce,

Charlie knew I was broke.

He offered me some money to do some accounting and bookkeeping.

I think I mentioned...

- I remember you telling me a little bit about this,

but it was just spotty.

- Yeah, so anyway, right after he killed himself,

his office manager got in touch with me

and just wanted to send me some

of the financials from the business.

- Okay.

- And so I got these boxes of financials

and I didn't think anything of it,

so I just threw it into storage.

- Right.

- But then after I saw your video,

I decided to go through one of the boxes,

and in one of the boxes I found this.

- What is this?

- You are not going to believe this.

- What is it? - It's very old.

- Yeah, clearly.

- It is the history of the Church of Heaven's Light.

- No way. - I kid you not.

- There's old photos.

- Be very careful with it. - Yeah, yeah, yeah.

- Old photos,

diaries, everything.

The crazy shit that Charlie used to talk about,

it's all in here.

And it's written by,

get this,

it's written by a guy, his name was Timothy Anker.

- Charlie Anker. Oh my god.

- I think it's like his great great-grandfather or something,

Oh my god, that's crazy.

who wrote this.

I don't even know where to start to tell you what's in here.

First of all,

what do you know about the Mormon church?

- I, not very much, I know, like John Smith or Joe Smith.

- Joseph Smith.

See, I didn't know either, so I did a deep dive.

I took some notes.

Okay, so after the death of Joseph Smith,

Brigham Young, you've heard of him, right?

Okay, so he leads the group from, um,

he leads a group from Nauvoo, Illinois, to Salt Lake City.

That's how they land in Utah.

- Okay.

- And at the same time, there was a group of 30 or so Puritans

living in a place called Viroqua, Wisconsin.

Viroqua

- Viroqua, Wisconsin.

Okay, so you don't know any of this,

but I hired this guy, this man,

I found these journals in this shipping container down there.

They were full of numbers and all sorts of weird equations,

and I gave them to a mathematician

who was a, just a peer of mine

and its coordinates

and its coordinates to a place in Viroqua, fucking Wisconsin.

- Yeah. This is... - What?

- Okay. Keep going, keep going.

- Okay, so when they heard of Brigham Young's exodus,

they decided to join him and go to Salt Lake City,

but once they arrived there, the group from Wisconsin

had issues with Young's leadership in the church.

And, you know, their views

were far more conservative than the Mormons.

- So I know, right? - Wow, yeah.

- How do you be more conservative than them?

- Yeah.

- So they decided to pick up and go west.

They went to a place called

Mount Shasta, Northern California.

- Yeah, we... - No, yeah.

- We drove past Mount Shasta

- Right, exactly, I think we went up there once.

They put down roots

and established a religious community for over 40 years.

So this section I want to read for you

speaks specifically to what you said you saw, those people.

- Yeah.

- "Our camp has become a strong community

over the past four months.

We've thrived in the shadow of the mighty Mount Shasta.

It feels as though all of our promises have come true.

Our church leader, Reverend Ramsey,

has truly delivered us unto salvation

by setting up this community of faithful.

There have been multiple sightings and visitations

from holy apparitions since we've come to camp."

- What?

"After every sighting, there are several worshippers

who are suddenly cured of all ailments,

while at the same time

there are a few unfortunate members of our church

who are stricken with a terrible deformity.

It's as if their heads and faces have become bloated

by some terrible condition.

They lose the ability to speak and communicate,

but they seem to have grown more robust in other ways.

I see them working in the rain and cold longer than most,

but because of their terrible brow,

they are ostracised by the rest of the church.

I'm afraid the council will vote to exile them

from our congregation."

There's another section I think it was written by Charlie.

I think he did a deep dive on this.

- "So after settling into the church in the 1860s,

the congregation started experiencing strong segregation

from the results of the divine visits.

Parishioners who were liberated from their ailments

were known as the blessed,

whilst those suffering deformities

were known as the cursed."

How creepy is that?

Dude, this is so medieval.

Oh my God.

"So also, there are rumours that after an unholy visitation

from Count Saint Germain in 1873,

there is a spiritual gateway or portal

that is opened as a result."

- I mean, what the fuck?

- "Saint Germain was a fa..."

I've heard of this guy.

"...was this famous French mystic

who was known around the world as a powerful alchemist

who died in 1784.

This rumoured visit has a massive impact on the community,

as many of the congregation believed

Germain to be a heretic

and therefore making way for wickedness in the church

rather than holy work and observance.

There are suddenly sightings of angels and demons

moving in and out of the world.

Some witnesses claim to see giants moving

through wooded landscapes at night.

Some sceptical church members actually crossed

the plane of the portal and are changed forever,

some blessed and some cursed.

Terrified, the community forbids any travel to the site

and declares the area condemned by God.

The rift in the church grows

and the community becomes defined by two separate camps,

the blessed living in the light of the sun and the cursed,

retreating deeper into the volcanic caves of the mountain."

Now that I got this,

I feel like I'm going to go back down to the Cuyamacas.

At least look around a little bit more now that I've got,

you know, almost like a guide here.

You know what I mean?

- Okay. Be careful, but I think you should go to Mount Shasta.

Like that's where they began.

That's where they settled.

God, it's just so weird.

- I know. Hold on a second, let me walk you out.

But hold on, let me put this down real quick.

Let me put the camera down, hold on one second.

I'm going to take your advice.

I'm going to go down to the, uh,

Cuyamacas, and then go up to Mount Shasta,

and I'll stay close to you.

Meaning I'll call you and text you

and let you know what's going on.

- Be safe, stay safe.

- Yeah. For sure.

- I appreciate you.

- Wait.

- What?

- Let's not do that.

- No? I'm sorry, I didn't...

I just felt like we were connecting there, and...

- We're great, let's not go down that road

- Yeah, okay, fair enough.

- No, but...

- Yeah. I'm sorry.

- No, you're, you're good.

- All right, let me let me walk you out.

- You're okay.

Please be safe down there.

- Okay, I'll call you. - All right.

- Okay. - All right, Devin.

- I'll see you.

Fuck it.

Fuck!

Devin Adams, came back up at the mountain.

Set up camp last night.

Came down,

and the space you see behind me.

That great big open space.

That's where the shipping container was.

It's gone.

There is...

There are tracks in and out of this area, this location.

Um. They stop here because of the rain.

It rained here a lot.

Obviously, I think when I was gone.

So there's nothing there.

There is one small spray-painted stake

at the location where that shipping container was.

I have no fucking clue.

Something or someone came in here and took it out of here.

What's really weird is there isn't even an impression

of where that container would be.

It's just gone.

I mean, like I said before, it looks like there are tracks

coming in and out,

but it looks like something's been dug in there

or either may be buried.

I don't know,

but that's all that's left of the shipping container.

Okay, so it looks like, um, there was an orange case

buried in there.

So I'm going to pull it here and bring it over.

Uh, let me bring it over to the RZR.

Looks like an iPad or some sort.

All right, I'm going to bring it back to camp,

see what's going on.

I was able to open this up.

This is some type of a video storage device.

It looks like it's almost some kind of like a video diary.

I'm going to continue to go through this.

- I'm, uh...

I'm not feeling right.

Uh.

I have these daydreams.

They turn into

nightmares, and I'm...

It's like I'm in this mountain.

And I'm just hearing

just loud voices.

You don't have to worship a god.

you can worship another higher consciousness.

Everything that is going on in my head...

is recorded on this camera.

Every time I come out of it, it's all there.

I don't know, I think I'm, I think I'm...

losing something, I don't know.

- Okay, I have no idea what we just saw.

Whatever is on this device, based on that footage,

it's clear it's over 30 years old.

That is about the age Charlie was

when he, Kate and I used to come up here

to these mountains and camp.

But beyond that, I've never seen that footage before.

I have no idea what the fuck is going on.

It's clear I was meant to find this.

Or if this is some kind of a fucking hoax

that's gone way too far.

But I'm over my head here.

I need to get this material...

I need to show this, this, these videos to a professional.

Someone who, like a tech expert who can look at this stuff

and tell me how old it is, where and how it was created,

and just what the fuck is going on here,

because this is decidedly not fun anymore.

Everybody, this is Marissa Terrace.

She is the IT manager at the Everbank Conservatory.

I sent her some of those video files

that were on that video storage device.

She's an expert in IT and metadata,

to see if she, what her thoughts were.

I've known Marissa for years,

so I know the imagery is kind of haunting

and weird and hallucinatory, but what about the tech behind it?

What can you tell me about the tech?

- It's not descriptive or structural in any way.

Like it's not code, it's not numbers.

It's not even letters from a language,

like, it's all just weird symbols.

- My understanding, Marissa, about metadata

is it's, it is information,

meaning it's either letters or numbers,

communicating what is the reference to it?

What's the sources on this stuff?

What do you mean by symbols?

- So it's like a series of objects

that we've never seen before.

Most especially seated as metadata.

So we've seen,

so we've just stopped looking at the materials altogether

because we're afraid of a virus

spreading into our networks here.

So I can see some anxiety in the team in the office.

And we're all just afraid of some type of Trojan horse event

that could occur, that could occur to us.

Um, so I highly recommend being really careful

with how and where you show these clips

just in case it spreads.

- Oh.

Oh, shit.

Long ride through a winter storm,

but we have made it to Mount Shasta.

It's got some cloud cover and it is super cold,

it was just snowing a second ago when I got here.

So my hope is tomorrow this is going to clear,

and we'll start exploring the volcanic tubes.

I'm going to go directly to those coordinates

I got from Doctor Abigail, so.

But this whole valley is kind of extraordinary.

Look at this.

It's freaking gorgeous.

I think I'd find God here.

Okay, I gotta show you guys this.

The sun finally came out, and you can see the peak.

Check this out.

It's beautiful.

So, okay, I'm at the, um, coordinates location.

Uh, so it looks like I'm coming up on something here.

Uh, we may have, uh,

we may have found something here a second.

Oh, yeah.

We found it.

This is the first entrance to the cave.

Pretty substantial.

Um, there does look like there's been traffic here.

Obviously, there's, like,

uh, it looks like a lot of teenagers have been here.

There's, um, some graffiti on the walls.

I can see there's another cave over there.

God, this thing just opens up in all these different ways.

I'm just going to keep the body cam on.

So I've got my arms and hands and feet.

So if I take a tumble.

All right, let's see what happens here.

Oh.

Man, they just keep going.

The thing that is kind of incredible here

is just how vast they are.

Like they're massive.

They're they're truly cavernous.

And there's just there's no question being here,

you could live here.

Here's the thing that's really interesting.

It's very cold out,

it's 30 degrees outside, but it's easily about 55 in here.

Okay. I've decided to stop for a second.

I'm feeling very bad.

Like I'm feeling, uh, unbelievably woozy.

Uh, I don't quite know.

Um, I'm kind of on a pile of rocks here right now, and, um.

I'm not quite sure why this is just this unbelievable sudden

feeling of sickness has become, uh, just overwhelmed me.

I'm gonna shine a light on me and say I'm gonna head back.

- Devin, it's me.

Call me back when you get this, because it's important.

So I have a friend who knows a librarian in Monterrey.

This librarian has a collection of rare books and diaries

that were all published during the Gold Rush era.

And they even include some information on those

old mountain communities.

We found a short chapter on the Church of Heaven's Light,

but it's not good, Devin.

Listen, in the late 1890s,

the church was made up of remnants

of the gold migration to Mount Shasta.

These were derelict communities,

mostly of failed fortunes and desperate measures.

These unfortunates

turned to religious fever to improve their station,

but white magic gave way to black magic

within a few years.

Witchcraft, possession, sacrifice were all reported

as sordid behaviour in this dark and broken community.

Please, Devin, you have to call me back.

We need to talk about this before you continue

this investigation any further.

- Oh.

Oh.

- Hey, Devin.

I just wanted to talk to you for a second.

I just got a phone call from my team at the office.

Those disturbing videos that you sent us the other day

have been playing non-stop on loop

on all terminals at our office.

We've lost all control of the network.

I don't know what the fuck is going on, but it's not good.

Please call me as soon as you get this.

I need to talk to you as soon as possible.

- I don't jump to conclusions, but I do not...

I do not feel well.

I think this is probably going to do it.

I think I'm gonna pack it up and head back.

I gotta get the fuck out of here...

So today's going to be the last day on the mountain.

Terrible, terrible headaches,

um, but, uh, oh, God, wait, can't you see?

Let me get some light.

Hold on a second.

But yeah, it's pretty bad.

I think I'm gonna get out of here.

Um. I just feel like I must look like shit.

Oh, man.

Oh, no.

Is this... is this a dream?

I don't, I don't understand, where am I?

- You're in the Cuyamacas.

The place behind the clouds.

- Oh my God.

I never left the Cuyamacas.

So here we are.

I, uh.

I'm...

starting to have these horrific, uh, hallucinations,

or they're like, waking dreams.

And, um, and they happen at night too,

when I, if I'm, when I think I'm sleeping, but I don't know,

um, the lines between what is real and what's not real

are just getting more and more blurred.

But these images that I'm seeing

are showing up in the technology all around me,

like my phone or this, this device,

whatever this is,

it's, it's like recording.

It's like the technology around me

is recording what is in my mind.

And these images are terrifying.

When I, when I leave, I'm seeing these massive structures

growing under the ground.

They're like, it looks like they're made of bone,

but they're these huge spires that reach up into the sky

like 30 or 40ft,

and every day they're getting bigger and taller.

And I'm, I don't want to get close to them because they emit

this deep bass drone,

and it feels like my whole body is vibrating

when I get close to them.

And every day that goes by,

I feel like I'm losing my grasp of reality.

- Doctor Adams, it's me, Archer,

I thought I should call you again.

I haven't heard from you.

I'm getting worried.

But I found more information on the cult, okay,

and we really need to talk about it

because there's some sick, twisted, medieval shit

that's been going down up there,

and you are making me worried.

did get that job, so that's good.

Please call me.

- Reverend.

Reverend, Reverend.

Reverend.

- It's in the community.

Whatever is in my mind.

Whatever I see here

goes up here.

This machine,

this fucking screen.

Devin!

Wake up!

- It's nice to finally meet you.

Don't be afraid.

You're safe.

- Is this...

Is this a dream?

Like...

am I...

Am I projecting this?

- No,

this is real.

- I don't understand.

- I know it's going to be a little confusing for you,

but come sit down.

Let me explain.

I'm presenting myself in a form you can understand.

We thought it would make things a little easier for you.

I know this is hard for you to grasp,

but we are inside another dimension.

I'm not actually human.

I was thousands of years ago,

part of a species that existed alongside Homo Homosapiens.

We were cut off from the rest of evolving humanity

by a series of geographic shifts

that forced us to go deeper below the surface

in caves and volcanic tubes, living in darkness.

Our brains evolved differently than yours.

Underground,

we never had to fear being prey.

And without the use of our senses,

our intelligence and cognitive

skills grew at an exponential rate,

and we were able to access other dimensions,

moving through portals around the planet

for thousands of years,

using spires like the one we're in now.

- How is it that we haven't seen you?

How have you been hidden from us?

- We're not hidden.

We come and go as we like.

And you see us all the time.

Moving through the fourth dimension cast shadows

and your technology and intuition

picks it up as paranormal activity.

- What about the Church of Heaven's Light?

Are you part of all of that?

- No.

the history of the church is human.

They simply made a mistake by establishing their community

too close to the portal near Mount Shasta.

The cursed humans you are tracking

are trespassers that have been corrupted

by going in and out the portal.

Time changes when humans cross the plane.

They live longer lives,

but their bodies are corrupted by the pressures within.

We have to relocate them when necessary.

- What about a man named Charles Anker?

Is he a part of this?

- Your friend is an abomination.

He's one of the founding members of the church.

He's lived for hundreds of years.

- We are the lesser species, Devin.

We always have been.

You don't have to worship a god.

You can worship another kind of higher consciousness.

- Charlie, how how how are you even here?

What's... Charlie, look at me.

- All you had to do was embrace the power and build anew.

I left you the videos.

The signal helped you cross over.

It holds our redemption.

You were the key, Devin.

My body was giving out.

- The key to what?

I don't...

Please help me understand.

I'm trying to understand.

- The church needed a new leader.

This was your opportunity to help us begin again.

To worship at the feet of the higher species.

They deserve our obedience, our worship, our love.

Why can't you see that?

- Don't worry, Devin,

we know this is difficult for you.

We will wipe your memory

and return you home.

Don't project the memory, Devin.

You'll corrupt the spire!

The lesser species, indeed.

- Okay, bye.

Take this.

Look, I don't care who you need to call,

but we need to get someone on this right away.

It's been over six months.

Not a day goes by that his ex-wife doesn't call me.

Is this, is this her?

Archer, this is Sheriff Gotlieb.

Can you hear me?

- Sheriff? Um.

Yeah, how can I help you, sir?

Look, I don't have a lot of time,

and I know you're fairly new to our office,

but I need everyone's help on this.

I'm sending you a secured link with evidence

we recovered from a deserted trailer

up in Cuyamaca Mountains.

It's a digital download

taken from what looks like an iPad device

we found at the site.

Uh, we haven't seen this material yet,

so yours were the first eyes.

But based on the licence and the registration

of the vehicle,

we think it may offer clues to a man that's

been reported missing.

Look, it should be coming through shortly.

- Okay. I just got it through my email.

Let me see if it will open on my end.

Okay.

- Can you get moving on this right away?

- Doctor Adams?

- Did you hear me?

- Holy shit, Sheriff, I know this man.

- Archer?

Can she hear me?

- What the hell is this?

- I think the connection might be bad.

Archer, are we good?

- Oh my God.