Spectral 2016

Dr. Mark Clyne, a DARPA researcher, is summoned to Moldova amidst the ongoing Moldovan War to lend his expertise on his invention—hyperspectral imaging goggles that the US military has issued to its troops. Upon his arrival at a US Military Air Base on the outskirts of Chisinau, he meets General Orland and CIA officer Fran Madison. They show him disturbing footage captured by the troops’ goggles, depicting a mysterious, translucent humanoid apparition that seems capable of instantaneous lethal force. While Orland seeks Clyne’s insights on the findings, Madison, suspecting it to be advanced insurgent camouflage, is tasked with retrieving a sample.

To investigate the phenomena more closely, Clyne and Madison are deployed with Delta Force operators to search for the Utah team that vanished the previous day. Clyne attaches a large version of his hyperspectral camera onto an armored personnel carrier to capture clearer images of the apparitions. Upon reaching the location, they discover that the Utah team has been brutally killed and are quickly ambushed by the very apparitions they seek to understand. With the attackers showing immunity to small arms and explosives, the soldiers suffer heavy losses before retreating.

Seeking refuge in an abandoned factory, they stumble upon two children barricaded inside. The children explain that their father had scattered iron shavings as a protective measure before he was killed, which fortuitously halts the pursuing apparitions. After establishing communication with the air base, a rendezvous is organized. Clyne ingeniously modifies the camera into a searchlight, allowing the group to visibly track the apparitions without the specialized goggles. He then equips their unit with IEDs infused with iron shavings, bolstering their chances against the looming threat.

As they exit the factory, the spectral beings chase after them, hindered but not fully incapacitated by the iron explosives. Upon reaching a large, desolate plaza, they are met with reinforcements for an aerial evacuation. However, as the group is ambushed by apparitions, they barely manage to escape while the figures wreak havoc, destroying tanks and slaughtering soldiers sent as backup. Mid-air, they learn from Orland that the apparitions have overwhelmed the Air Base, prompting a redirection to a civilian bunker operated by the allied Moldovan military.

Clyne speculates that the apparitions are likely a man-made creation composed of Bose-Einstein condensate, explaining their supernatural abilities and vulnerabilities. Together with Orland and surviving engineers, he works diligently overnight to construct makeshift pulse weapons that can degrade the condensate. By morning, the remaining American soldiers are armed with these new weapons and dispatched to a crucial power plant in the heart of the city, where Clyne believes they can generate the necessary power to combat the condensate.

While the soldiers engage in battle atop the plant, Clyne and Madison explore a recently vacated laboratory. They uncover that scientists employed by the former regime were conducting molecular-level scans of humans, using advanced 3D printing technologies to replicate them in condensate form. In a haunting revelation, they find that the brains and nervous systems of human test subjects were linked to a central machine, keeping the condensate apparitions animated. Just as the apparitions seem poised to win the battle, Clyne triggers a failsafe, deactivating them. Compassionately, he unplugs the human remnants from the machine, granting them a long-awaited peace.

Having neutralized the apparitions, the US and Allied Moldovan military take steps to regain control of the city from insurgents. Plans are set for a Department of Defense extraction team to disassemble the machinery at the power plant, possibly repurposing it. After bidding farewell to Madison and General Orland, Clyne boards a flight bound for home in Virginia, marked by the bitter memories of his harrowing experience in Moldova.