The man sat alone at a broad, black desk – bare, save for a single paper dossier and a silver pen. His suit was charcoal, impeccably cut, pressed sharp at every angle.
On his neck sat a tie that broke the symmetry: leopard-print silk, bold and deliberate, like a private joke worn in public. A joke no one would dare laugh at.
He turned a page without urgency. No screens. No noise. Just paper, pen, and the weight of his knowledge.
He read.
Incident report: April 6th, 2031
Operation Tango Down yielded mixed results. Rapid Response Units (RRUs) Beta-3 and Lambda-7 raided Dr. Takahashi's house – ordered to gather intel. Shoot to kill for any potential occupants was authorised.
Beta-3 was in charge of securing the ground floor, inner cordon, and outer cordon. Whilst Lambda-7 was in charge of securing the first floor. Beta-3 reported no substantial findings, however, Lambda-7 reported findings within the office room – as intercepted in the encrypted phone call.
Lambda-7 entered the office, which had an already accessed hidden safe, unlocked, completely empty. The only useful material recovered was a USB drive (will be referenced later).
Furthermore, the window was open. Suggesting a failure in first: Lambda-7 to properly neutralise any targets, and second: failure in Beta-3 to properly secure the inner and outer cordons. It is believed a singular person escaped during the operation. This is unverified.
It is my personal advice that you punish select members of Beta-3 and Lambda-7 accordingly.
Now, onto the USB drive. It contained 2 files. One, a semi-redacted .txt file report of initial tests of Substance Omega, you can find a copied insert attached to this report, and an .mp4 file of drone surveillance showing a figure and early attempts of The Eden Protocol. A copy of the USB is also attached to this report
It is my belief that the figure in the video is linked to Dr. Takahashi's Contingency Protocol 18-65 incident that occurred on April 7th, at approximately 6:38 PM JST.
Notably, this aforementioned figure was killed during early attempts of The Eden Protocol, but was [REDACTED] via [REDACTED] [REDACTED] during the [REDACTED][REDACTED]. The database shows the shell still active within World Liberator.
Issues stemmed from our inability to successfully track where Dr. Takahashi uploaded this figure to, due to our relatively loose control on World Liberator.
If you look at the attached USB, you'll see a distinct signature ability linked to the figure: Steelthorn Lockdown. However, due to the nature of the system and World Liberator itself, we were unable to track this ability unless it had first been registered to an assigned player profile within internal system logs, enabling standard tracking protocols to engage.
This would have rendered the operation ineffective, however, the system proved reliable once again, recently receiving 2 separate report submissions which included the keywords 'Steelthorn Lockdown.'
Case ID: #381, and Case ID: #608.
This has allowed us to track his movement. Player ID: 'Ren'.
However, I am wary of this as we are not fully certain that Dr. Takahashi's Contingency Protocol 18-65 yielded successful results (due to the upload only reaching 91%), and as such, we are not certain that his shell is consciously present. You understand the overt nature of these tracking methods, which in of itself could reveal the nature of the masking devices.
We do not wish to give anybody any clues regarding Substance Omega. Therefore, it is my personal opinion that we simply put him on The List, and ensure he does not wander too close to any Blue Sites.
Furthermore, I regret to inform you that Dr. Takahashi's M.E.L.I.N.D.A. AI meant that we were unable to decipher who received Dr. Takahashi's phone call.
This means we are still missing a variable.
And that is unacceptable, Director.
He didn't sigh. He simply closed the folder, placed the pen beside it, and sat back – quiet, still, unreadable.
His tie caught a flicker of light as he stood.
And then he was gone.