>>45701322

The dim light was leaking through the blinds and into your small office.
It was the kind of faint light that barely manages to penetrate the clouds in an overcast day.
Stuck in front of your writing machine, you’re trying to assemble a report as accurate as possible of your activities in the past operation.
It had been nothing more than a classical infiltration and espionage mission in order to take down a black market circle, however the ringleaders proved to be extremely tenacious. Even when surrounded and outnumbered by your men, they decided to attempt to flee, forcing you to give chase.
The pursuit had been rowdy, involving considerable damage to private property, and you were tasked with writing down the official report, a chore you usually prefer to leave to others.

And yet this time the Marshall insisted, on the grounds that under certain circumstance, the Protectorate could waive civil responsibility, if damage to private property was incurred in an anti-terrorism operation. One of the conditions, of course, was that the Chief of Operations had to personally relate on his conduct and his decision, explaining carefully why they were taken and why they were strictly necessary.

When you were a child, looking at the posters of the SSA made you think of a bright and exciting future defending the borders of the Protectorate from Mutants and from the greedy corporations of the North. Then, with time, you came to realize that what you were protecting was not your people, but the Lord Protector and his ministers, all the while becoming the embodiment of all that is despicable in the eyes of the commoners.

>>45701336

Caeruleans especially were never fond of the Secret Security Agency. Living in the capital, they enjoyed a lifestyle somewhat more luxurious than the rest of their fellow countrymen, and with wealth came liberalism.
You’ve been working on the report for hours now, thinking to yourself that paper work isn’t that bad after all. You’re young, maybe you can still quit the Agency and find yourself another job. A job where people don’t hate you by default.
Yeah, that’s what you will do. You will hand this in as soon as you’re done, have a talk with the Marshall and…
Somebody’s knocking on the door.
“I am coming in, Blecynzki.”
Speak of the devil.
Marshall Pleckanov, a tall, stern man in his sixties, was in charge of the SSA Department of Caerulea. An extremely reasonable man, considering the environment in which he worked. It is rumored that he resents the General Director of the SSA and his only superior, Commander Tsenno.

You stand up on attention, to which he responds just waiving his hand as to tell you not to bother.
“I need to talk with you, Blecynski. Can you spare a few?”

>”Sure, Sir.”
>”I cannot right now, Sir”

>>45701361
>>”I cannot right now, Sir”

>>45701361
>>”Sure, Sir.”
Duh. That's what you do in a place like SSA.

>>45701361
>”Sure, Sir.”

>>45701512
>>45701672

“Sure, Sir. Please, take a seat”
“That won’t be necessary, as I said, it’s a matter of few minutes. We might have located a potential traitor in our ranks, and you’d be the best man to deal with the situation. I will give you the details in my office, just come visit me in a couple of hours”
“Yes, sir”

He slowly takes his leave, and you sit on your chair once again. Your focus is gone, as well as your dreams for the near future. Why would Pleckanov bother informing you directly rather than sending a secretary or a subject?
it’s not like traitors, or those suspected to be one, are uncommon topic of conversation in the Agency.
The unpleasant suspicion that one of your relatives might be involved in illicit traffics or shady meetings starts to creep on you.
The hours pass slowly. You write a few more lines, but that’s about it. There’s nothing in your mind right now besides the meeting. It is not excitement: it’s anxiety, it’s fear, and at the bottom of this Pandora’s Box, the feeble hope that things won’t turn out to be as bad as you’re afraid they might be.

Eventually, the fated time comes.
You stand up and head for the Marshall’s Office at a steady pace.
Your heart beats the rhythm of a military march, as you feel sweat forming on your brow.
Knocking on his door a few times, all the while hearing him faintly talking with someone else.
“Come in”, he says, neither politely nor imperiously.

The door opens, revealing a familiar figure standing behind his desk, as well as a soldier clad in a somewhat strange armor. Undoubtedly a man of the 13th Division, a military branch usually dealing with the most severe threats to the Protectorate as well as carrying out special operations.
You gulp with uneasiness. Nothing good can come from this.
The Marshall motions you to take a seat next to spec ops soldier.

>>45702100

You reluctantly sit down, trying not to look at the mysterious soldier. Weird stories go hand in hand with the men of the 13th, who are usually accused of being half-mutants as well as mindless puppets kept in check through the use of a cocktail of drugs.
Naturally there’s no evidence of this, and most people who co-operate with the 13th go out of their way to deny all those rumors, yet the threat of imprisonment for those guilty of “spreading misinformation” is more than enough to ensure that the legend stays alive.

“Is something the matter, Commissar Blecynzki?”

>Demand to know why the 13th Division is involved
>”No sir, please go ahead.”

>>45702142
>>”No sir, please go ahead.”

>>45702142
>>”No sir, please go ahead.”

And one question. How are you supposed to pronounce "Blecynzki"? Blech-chin-ski?

>>45702261
either that or Ble-zin-ck-i
I am actually curious myself

>>45702261
This would be correct
>>45702171
“No sir, please go ahead”.
“Very well. I assume you’re familiar with Takeshi Tezuka, are you not?”

Your heart sinks. Takeshi Tezuka, military scientist. One of the most brilliant minds of his generation.
Despite the difference in age, you bonded fairly quickly during a mission in which you were required to work together to locate and put down a Mutant Cult.
You hadn’t heard of him in a while, nor did he respond to the last few letters you sent him. You assumed he was busy with some top-secret project, but it looks like reality is a tad more complicated than that.
“Yes sir. We worked together in the past”, you say reluctantly.
“When’s the last time you talked with him?”
“In person, sir?”
“In person, via mail or via telegraph, I don’t care. When was the last time?”
“Two years ago at the latest, sir.”
“Did he mention anything about his visit and his occupation at the Great Wall?”
You try to recall bits and sentences from your last talk together. He was excited about his latest project, something related to the military marine.
“He barely said anything about that, sir. He seemed uncomfortable while talking about it. I guess he didn’t have a pleasant experience, sir.”

Pleckanov nods heavily, taking notes of what you said.
You attempt to steal a glance at the soldier’s uniform, which seems to be littered with all sorts of obscure symbols and runes.
“Commissar Blecynzki, I will go straight to the point. Tezuka is suspected of hosting and nurturing a mutant in his house. What possessed him to do something so dangerous is beyond us. We don’t believe you’re involved, however we would appreciate if you were to help us in our investigation”.

>>45703319
You’re shaking. Your friend is involved with mutants. This is usually enough to warrant an execution in the Protectorate, but the Marshall is asking you for your help instead.
“Why me?”, you ask, stuttering and mumbling, adding “sir” to your question only after a few seconds.
The Marshall looks at you with a mix of contempt and curiosity.
“You’re his closest friend inside the Agency, Commissar. Eventually it comes down to a trade-off between someone closer to him than you, but farther outside of our reach, and someone closer to us than to him. In this situation, you represent a sort of golden compromise.”
You nod, trying to control your fear.
“Then it’s settled. You and the men of Captain Virkevicius here will start your investigation from tomorrow. Take the rest of the day off. Any questions?”

>”I would like to quit after this, sir”
>”I would like to meet the Captain’s men before the operation, sir”.

>>45703352
>”I would like to meet the Captain’s men before the operation, sir”.
Never, every say something like that before a mission! Only after.

>>45703352
>”I would like to meet the Captain’s men before the operation, sir”.
Don't be the potential weak link in their eyes, don't get Sicario'd.

>>45703500
>>45703612

You slowly turn towards Captain Vikrevicius, taking a closer look at his armor.
It seems completely insulated. His helmet is attached to an anti-gas mask that the captain seems to be wearing even outside of combat. He has no weapons with him, but just looking at him fills you with the certainty he’d probably be able to kill you bare-handed.
Plenty of strange decorations are painted on his uniform, making it look more like a graffiti than a military garment.
On his left should, you spot a tag with his identification number: 19061994
“Sir, would it be alright to meet the Captain’s team before the operation?”, you ask, while still looking at the officer standing besides you. He doesn’t return your gaze.
“Well that would be up to the Captain. What do you say, Virkevicius?”
For a few minutes, absolute silence engulfs the room. Then a deep and guttural voice says “Naturally. Please come with me, Commissar”.
You stand up and give a military salute to the Marshall, then you follow the Captain through the door.

“Are your men in this building, Captain?”
“Yes, they are in the basement. Talk with those I will introduce you. It’s better to leave the rest alone.”
This is his last, jarring remark for the duration of your trip to the lower levels of the Agency Headquarters.

Captain Virkevicius’s squad is composed of 10 soldiers, including himself.
Of those, only three of them are called by the Captain to answer your questions: 23011993, 21091996 and 18052005.
While all of them respect the military etiquette and seem to be quite normal, the same can’t be said about the other member of the team. Some of them are muttering to themselves, another is crouching on the floor with his head wrapped around his arms, and one of them is going around the room, sometimes screaming and sometimes whispering, punching the walls from time to time.

>>45704254

You strive to focus on the soldiers right in front of you, but the Captain seems to have noticed your restlessness.

“What is it, Commissar? I bet you’re starting to believe the funny stories you’ve heard about us now, aren’t you?” he laughs harshly and without empathy, as if to ridicule you and yours soldiers alike.
You attempt to keep your composure.

>Inquire about the strange symbols
>Inquire about the discipline in the squad

>>45704290
>Inquire about the discipline in the squad
Basically what is this shit? The most capable weapon in the world is the human brain and those "soldiers" seem to be lacking it.

>>45704290
>Inquire about the discipline in the squad
this this this

>>45704290
>>Inquire about the discipline in the squad
Stop shitposting and continue the story already. For fucks sake, you're busting my balls here.

>>45705030
>>45704900
>>45704371

“A rather large and distressing number of stories does indeed circulate about the 13th Division and their unorthodox methods. It is not my place nor my role to judge their efficiency, however. I am sure those will be put to the test tomorrow”
“Aye”, answers the Captain. He seems to have understood what you were hinting at. “My soldiers look like a pack of rabid dogs, I do not deny it. Yet I can assure you that our track record is stellar, we do not make mistakes because making mistakes isn’t an option. A dog learns to obey the master, and if not the master, at least the stick that beats him. Keep this in mind”.
His tone of voice is harsh, yet he doesn’t seem to be upset. Rather, it sounds like he’s heard the same question multiple times by now, and he’s just tired of answering.
“Speaking of which, Commissar. Is there anything we can fetch you from the armory? Where we’re going, your ordinance gun won’t do much”.
You stroke your chin pensively. “Do you happen to have non-lethal weapons? Those might come in useful”.
The Captain laughs again. “Sure, we’ll bring some nice toys for our pacifist friend. Nothing else then? Ah, forget it. I will take care of it. It will be my treat”.

He turns around and yells a couple of commands to his squad, which promptly forms a line and stands on attention.

“I will be leaving now. We’ll meet here and proceed to Doc’s tomorrow morning. Don’t make us wait.”
“You know where he lives?”
He’s wearing an helmet, but you can’t shake the feel that he’s giving you a condescending look.
“Right. See you there, Captain”.
The soldiers leave the basement one after another, in perfect order.
You decide to heed the Marshall’s advice and head for your place.
Your apartment isn’t far away from your workplace, but it’s squalorous and tiny.

>>45705514

You live alone, with the comfort of a stove and of a radio that, from time to time, gives you solace in the shape of a pleasant song.
Your meals are measly, but tonight that’s not what’s keeping you awake. It’s rather the sheer terror of what awaits you tomorrow.

You barely sleep, and you’re awake with the dawn. You take a cold shower and get ready as quickly as you can. The image of the Captain standing in front of the Headquarters, all high and mighty, scolding you for the delay, pesters you and makes you upset.
Yet no one is waiting for you at the entrance of the Agency Building. Satisfied, you wait until a couple of military vehicles, bearing no insigna nor emblems, stop in front of you.
Captain Virkevicius gestures you to come in, and you do so without hesitation. He greets you a little bit more warmly once you’re inside.
“Good Morning Commissar. Impressive punctuality”

No other words are exchanged for the duration of the trip.
The Scientist house is located far from the city center, ripe with conods, and near the border with the countryside, where villas with gardens are abudant.
The area seems strangely deserted. Only a few people seem to be around, and most of the people around decide to return inside their houses as soon as they see you and the 13th approaching.

Virkevicius hands you a gun loaded with tranquilizer. “This is your non-lethal weapon. Satisfied?”
You nod. Then he gives you a rifle much like the one he’s using. “This is just in case things get rough”.
You barely believe that, considering that few of the soldiers are carrying machine guns already. No, this is not if the situation gets rough. The situation IS already rough, this rifle is just an additional safety measure for the Captain.

“So what do you say Commissar? Do we knock or do we just barge in?”

>”Let’s offer him the chance to surrender”
>”we can take no risk. Let’s break through the door”

>>45705699
>>”we can take no risk. Let’s break through the door”
Obviously. They don't call it no-knock raids for no reason.

>>45705699
>>”we can take no risk. Let’s break through the door”

>posts short snippets of uninteresting parts of uninteresting story
>wonders why no one gives him (you)s
10/10 logic m8.

>>45705980
>>45706474
“We barge in and leave our manners at the door, Captain. I don’t think we can afford to take on too many risks, considering we’re dealing with a genius.”
“Roger that”, he says, and then motions with his hand to one of his soldiers.
He stealthily moves on to the door, until he’s close enough to land a powerful kick that breaks it down.
Having moved the now destroyed door aside, he raises his arm as to signal the rest of the squad to move in and follow him, just before an ear-shattering explosion breaks the stony silence.
You immediately jump to the ground face-down and with your arms covering your head, as the wind of the conflagration brings some debris your way.

You slowly rise up to assess the situation: one man has been blown away by the booby-trapped house. No one seems to be injured, although people are fleeing the nearby houses screaming.
Virkevicius is standing tall and commanding his men around. Seems like he’s tasked them with retrieving the dead soldier’s heart.

“I respect your decision, Captain. It is important to give a proper burial to your men. But it might also be dangerous, if there are other explosives laying around”.
“That’s unlikely. The entire house has been destroyed, meaning that our doctor put all his eggs in one basket. And who talked about burial? Normally we would resurrect a dead soldier, but I guess the state of the corpse doesn’t allow us to follow the standard procedure”
“Standard procedure?”

>>45706627
“It’s a pain, let me tell you that much. Death isn’t easily cheated”.
The Captain’s speech leaves you flabbergasted. You have no time to react, as an even more harrowing scene unfolds in front of you.
The Captain is walking towards one of his men, who is holding a piece of metal in his left hand and a still-beating human heart in his right hand.
Virkevicius removes his helmet-mask, revealing a skull-like face, with short black hair and hollow dark eyes. He bites the heart, chewing it with gusto before swallowing it.
Your stomach gives in, expelling all its contents as you fold. By the time you’re standing again, Virkevicius is donning his helmet, passing the piece of scrap metal to the restless soldiers you had seen yesterday.
The soldier fiddles with the metal piece, brings it to his nose, covered by the mask, and finally throws it away.
After briefly consulting with his subject, the Captain turns to face you.
“Very well Commissar. We might have a hunch on where your friend is hiding. My apologies, this is gonna take longer than we had expected”.

>Demand an explanation
>Ask how he obtained information on the doctor’s whereabouts

>>45706647
>Ask how he obtained information on the doctor’s whereabouts
Treat them like fags, don't ask, don't tell.

>>45706782
“Wait, I will let the whole heart-eating business slip, but I demand to at least know how you know where we ought to go”
“It’s simple: our man here, 21122012, can smell memories and psychic traces”
“Psychic…traces?”
“Yes, Commissar. The traces left by a magic user, in other words, by mutants”.
You’re not as surprised as you thought you’d be. By now, you long realized that something was off with these soldiers. Only a mutant could do something like cheating death and smell someone’s psyche.
“What memories are imbued in that piece of scrap metal?”
“21122012, give him a demonstration”, the Captain declares unflinchingly.
The soldier known only by his tag name starts producing noise akin to that of a radio attempting to tune in on a frequence.
Then, the awful scream of a young girl in pain pierces your ears.
It comes from the radio-soldier, who is standing perfectly still despite the horrible cries of pain that seem to come from him.
“Daddy, daddy it hurts! It hurts so bad, daddy!”
“I Know, dear, I know. But there’s no other way. If they were to see you with those arms…”
“Why do they hate me daddy? I didn’t do anything daddy, I promise! I’ve been a good girl!”
“Daddy knows, Rin. You were not naughty. It’s those men, who were naughty. And I must protect you from them”

>>45708111

The transmission stops there.
Virkevicius and what’s left of his squad head to the vehicles, stoic as ever.
The trip takes you to the other side of the city, that close by the lake.
All the while, you can’t help thinking. Takeshi has rescued a youngster mutant, likely chopped off her arms, and hid her from the government. Why would he do something like that?
“Because that girl is technopathic”, Virkevicius claims.
“Huh?”
“Technopathic. She can assemble and disassemble machinery with her mind.” He stops, noticing that you’re still puzzled. “Oh, that. Well, I was reading your mind. Sorry for the intrusion, but you were getting worked up about that and I thought I’d help”
“Well, thank you then. But how do you know about the girl’s power?”
“21122012 discerned it from the piece of metal. I discerned it reading his mind. And now you know because I just told you”.
“Fair enough”.

The convoy transporting you and the 13th Division stops by an abandoned hut by the lake.
It’s your last chance to ask for informations

>”What can we expect from the girl, Captain?”
>”What can we expect from the doctor, Captain?”

>>45708184
"What can we expect from them both" preferably. But since your protagonist seems to be beyond stupid ”What can we expect from the doctor, Captain?” appears to be the least shit choice.

>>45708184
>”What can we expect from the doctor, Captain?”

"What can we expect from the Doctor, Captain?"
"From the doctor? He maybe has a gun, and maybe one or two more aces up his sleeve. The real problem is the girl. I will try to contain her powers, but if she’s more powerful than 21122012 perceived, we might be in for troubles and shenanigans.”

As you and the captain discuss, the men of the 13th have taken position in front of the hut.
It seems relatively small, with room for two people at most.
Slowly, the entrance door opens. A middle aged man walks towards the soldiers with his hands raised.
“You’ve found me. No use in looking for the girl though, she’s dead as a result of my experiments. Kill me if you have to”. He turns towards you. “Oh, Blecynzki. Sorry for not responding to your letters. I was kind of busy. I was hoping we would part on better terms”, he says dejectedly.
“Captain, arrest this man”, you say. “he’s guilty of treason against the Protectorate and its…”
The sound of a gun being fired deafens you for a second.
“… people”. Virkevicius shot the man right between his eyes, and his corpse is now folding and falling before your eyes. He motions to his men to follow him inside the hut.

>>45709095
>The real problem is the girl.
Nice illusion of choice you got there, m8.

>>45709095
The interiors of the hut are dirty and mouldy. The psionic soldier is being used as a hound to look for more traces of the girl. In a few minutes, a trap door carefully hidden below the parquet has been located. There appears to be a ladder which likely leads to a cellar
“I will go down to see what’s there”, you volunteer. “Wait for me outside”.
As the soldiers take their leave, you proceed down the stairs to a small, lightless room.
Your eyes slowly adjust to obscurity, and you notice a small figure pressed agains the corner of the room.
“Rin? Is that you?”
“Huh? You know me?”
Tezuka knew he was done for. He tried to save the girl as he could, but he was a cornered dog. Hiding the girl here was as desperate as futile.
“Yes, I am a friend of your father. Let’s get out of here.” At least that was just half a lie.
You grab her frail body with one of your arms, using the other to climb the ladder.
Thankfully, Virkevicius and his men have disposed of the corpse of the doctor: there’s no trace of his demise in the hut or outside. You lay the girl down, and head for the vehicles that have transported you there.
Rin follows you, and then stops as soon as she notices one of the 13th’s soldiers.

>>45709246
“Rin…”, you call out to her.
Something flashes in the little girl’s eyes, and suddenly the rifle of the soldier next to you explodes.
A soldier attempts to shoot at her but the gun seems to be jammed.
You look at her. There is a grim determination in her eyes, as well as rage. Her veins seem to be glowing unnaturally. As quickly as you can, you grab the tranquilizer gun and shoot her.
Few seconds later, sharp pain pierces you through your chest.
In a split second, the girl had redirected the jammed guns, malfunctioning no longer, to target you, and the result was that high-caliber bullets had crippled your body.
You fall to the ground, a bloody mess, just like the girl in front of you falls down, exhausted and sedated.
The Captain walks towards you, and you stretch your hand to him. But he passes through you, grabbing the girl instead.
He then turns to one of his soldier.
“He’s too wounded to be saved. Were he a mutant… just put him out of his misery”
“No…I beg of you…”, you whisper, or you think. The world is red and nothing makes sense anymore.
The noise of a gun being fired is the last thing you hear.

>>45709273
So is this the end? No choice no nothing.

>>45709500
Aye, for this prologue, this is end.
(And for the prologue sessions as well, since this was the last prologue)

I didn't plan a lot of choices as this was meant to be a "Short" quest, more focused on giving some background information on the world and on some of its inhabitants.

From the next quest we'll focus on the MC, who will (hopefully) not die as easily.