The runway welcod us with teeth.
Concrete stretched like a scar under a gray, unforgiving sky. Wind howled low and sharp, tugging at my coat and ringing the bells of my mask like an on. The mont the plane's wheels kissed ground, I felt it—the shift. The silence. The eyes.
The Republic did not like visitors.
It tolerated intrusions the way a snake tolerates footsteps: with patience and poison.
We disembarked into the cold, unblinking eye of a nation pretending not to watch. I stepped off the plane first, violet boots flashing like heresy on the tarmac, and struck a pose so ridiculous I nearly twisted an ankle.
"Ah!" I cried, arms wide to the sky. "Bless this land of iron and frost! May your concrete dreams never thaw!"
Caras clicked. Reporters in gray coats clustered behind flimsy barricades. Not all of them were real. So, I suspected, hadn't written a word in years. Plainclothes agents stood among them like forgotten furniture—too stiff, too clean.
Elliot stepped down behind , clutching a bag, eyes darting. "Uh. They're... definitely looking at us."
"Let them," I said with a flourish, flipping my press credentials into the air like a playing card. "Let the performance begin."
Camille's handiwork, the badge glinted in the light: Mr. Jester – Conflict Zone Storyteller Extraordinaire. Below it, Anthony had added a QR code that led to a charming little site full of satire, misdirection, and just enough facts to cause headaches.
I waltzed toward the barricade.
"People of the press!" I declared. "Fear not the bells nor the stripes! I co bearing truth—loud, inconvenient, and dressed like a sin!"
So reporters chuckled. So didn't.
"Is this a protest?" one asked.
"God, no," I said. "It's journalism with extra seasoning."
Flashbulbs blinked. I posed. Behind the mask, my eyes scanned: the drone above, the twitchy officer near the stairway, the delay in our luggage arrival. Calculated. Expected.
I twirled a pen between gloved fingers. "Let us proceed, dear Elliot. The wolves await, and we've brought only riddles."
We wandered its veins in daylight—cracked streets, rusted signs, factories long abandoned. Here, silence had texture. Here, the air tasted like tal and mory.
I broadcasted live. Under Mr. Jester's na, of course—our "independent channel" was sothing rather obvious. Viewers watched from neutral zones, from border towns, from hiding. I gave them jokes. I gave them taphors.
I gave them fear with frosting.
"This building once held ten thousand workers," I said, standing before a soot-covered plant. "Now, it holds a pigeon, two ghosts, and one very confused fool."
Elliot translated for the locals. Slipped into dialects. He knew where to find the vendors still brave enough to talk. We played good clown, bad cop. I asked riddles about labor and policy. He bought bread and cigarettes as paynt.
Eventually, I saw a man in a knitted cap whispering to his friend: "A foreign woman was seen escorted into the Ministry building two nights ago—but no one saw her leave."
I posted it with the caption: In the Iron Republic, the light is punishnt, not rcy.
Though I made a ntal note of it, there was a chance that woman was Evelyn.
By the third hour, we had a tail.
Two, actually. The first wore poor clothing. The second was even sloppier—angry, alone, offended by the re idea of .
We ducked into a corner bakery.
When we erged, I spun dramatically and walked right up to the second man.
"Oh dear," I said, "I do believe you've dropped this!"
I handed him a laminated press badge:
HONORARY CLOWN.
"Because following is easier than leading."
He stared at it like it might explode.
"You're not funny. You and the Masked Syndicate should be removed for good." he said.
"I disagree. Vehently."
I posted the encounter. It went semi-viral within an hour. Neutral sympathizers loved it. The Republic's official site called it "foreign propaganda." I took that as a complint.
At night, we returned to our rented flat—boxy, unheated, surveilled. The faucet squeaked. The air slled of wet wires. I sat by the window, typing.
My "daily report" was a dance: a satirical breakdown of local infrastructure failures, frad as a children's fairy tale. I ended it with a cheerful rhy:
"When bridges break and lights go out,
The jester laughs, but not too loud.
For even truth, when wrapped in jest,
Can draw the blade upon one's chest."
Elliot watched from the bed, wide-eyed.
"You're really good at this," he said.
I glanced at him. "At what?"
"At... reporting everything while staying positive despite the hostility you encounter."
"Ah," I said with a smile. "Thank you."
Later, over lukewarm soup, he told about a childhood friend of his called Miro.
"We were kids," Elliot said. "Lived two blocks from the border wall. Miro was... smart. Always building things. He had this little drone he swore he could talk to."
I stirred my soup. "What happened?"
"One day, they said he was transferred. Top scores, off to so elite institute. But no one ever saw him again. They left his stuff on the sidewalk. No explanation. My mom said it was 'cranial swelling.' Said so kids just... broke too early."
My spoon stopped.
Cranial swelling.
I rembered the files from my attic. Subjects. All marked deceased. Neurological damage. Most within two weeks of testing.
"I never found his last na," Elliot said. "But sotis I think—what if it wasn't random? I an how many people do you know that die from learning to much?"
I didn't speak.
Because if I confird anything, he likely would be a victim of his own irony.
Later that night, we moved under the moonlight.
The Ministry compound was a brutalist relic—a block of shadow carved from reinforced paranoia. No guards at the side gate. No lights in the west wing.
Elliot hesitated.
"Wait. It's unlocked?"
"Clearly abandoned," I whispered, pocketing Camille's trick pen that she had given . "How negligent."
"...You didn't just pick that lock, right?"
"Of course not," I said, smiling beneath the mask. "I'm far too law-abiding."
We slipped inside.
The air shifted. Cold, still. Like the building was holding its breath. My boots barely made a sound on the tiled floor. We moved past empty desks, sealed file rooms, dusty terminals.
Until we found it.
A door marked Level B – Archive 2.
I humd the national anthem mockingly as I knelt and fiddled with the lock.
Elliot fidgeted behind . "This really doesn't feel abandoned."
Good
"You must be imagining things."
Click.
The door opened.
Inside: rows of cabinets. A single flickering monitor. tal shelves, cold as morgue drawers. So drawers were labeled by number. So by designation.
We stepped in.
The monitor played a loop.
A woman, pacing. Sterile room. Eyes fierce, movents sluggish. Bruises on her arms. Bare feet.
Elliot stepped forward. "That... that room's in this building. It's near the entrance of the basent. I rember those tiles."
I froze.
It wasn't Evelyn.
The posture was wrong. The lack of fire in her eyes was too noticeable. Evelyn always had one, like she was in constant control.
But it was soone recent. Soone held without trial.
Before I could process it, the monitor flickered.
[LOCKDOWN INITIATED]UNAUTHORIZED ACCESS – LEVEL B
A voice crackled down the hall. "Soone unlocked the front door."
Elliot jumped. "Sir, I thought you said this was abandoned?!"
The door behind us creaked—then began to slide shut.
"Move!" I barked.
I lunged for the console. Hands flew across keys. A bypass code Anthony taught failed. They likely changed it after the governnt split. I ripped open a cabinet instead—files fluttered.
One folder.
Just one.
Masked Syndicate – Protocols to Combat.
I stuffed it under my coat.
The lights went black.
Steel slamd shut behind us.
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