The runway welcomed 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 omen. The moment 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!"
Cameras clicked. Reporters in gray coats clustered behind flimsy barricades. Not all of them were real. Some, 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 me, 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 come bearing truth—loud, inconvenient, and dressed like a sin!"
Some reporters chuckled. Some 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 metal and memory.
I broadcasted live. Under Mr. Jester's name, of course—our "independent channel" was something rather obvious. Viewers watched from neutral zones, from border towns, from hiding. I gave them jokes. I gave them metaphors.
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 payment.
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 punishment, not mercy.
Though I made a mental 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 mere idea of me.
We ducked into a corner bakery.
When we emerged, 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:
"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. Vehemently."
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 compliment.
At night, we returned to our rented flat—boxy, unheated, surveilled. The faucet squeaked. The air smelled of wet wires. I sat by the window, typing.
My "daily report" was a dance: a satirical breakdown of local infrastructure failures, framed as a children's fairy tale. I ended it with a cheerful rhyme:
"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 me 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 me 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 some 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 some kids just... broke too early."
I remembered the files from my attic. Subjects. All marked deceased. Neurological damage. Most within two weeks of testing.
"I never found his last name," Elliot said. "But sometimes I think—what if it wasn't random? I mean how many people do you know that die from learning to much?"
Because if I confirmed 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.
"Wait. It's unlocked?"
"Clearly abandoned," I whispered, pocketing Camille's trick pen that she had given me. "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."
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.
A door marked Level B – Archive 2.
I hummed the national anthem mockingly as I knelt and fiddled with the lock.
Elliot fidgeted behind me. "This really doesn't feel abandoned."
"You must be imagining things."
Inside: rows of cabinets. A single flickering monitor. Metal shelves, cold as morgue drawers. Some drawers were labeled by number. Some by designation.
The monitor played a loop.
A woman, pacing. Sterile room. Eyes fierce, movements sluggish. Bruises on her arms. Bare feet.
Elliot stepped forward. "That... that room's in this building. It's near the entrance of the basement. I remember those tiles."
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 someone recent. Someone held without trial.
Before I could process it, the monitor flickered.
[LOCKDOWN INITIATED]UNAUTHORIZED ACCESS – LEVEL B
A voice crackled down the hall. "Someone unlocked the front door."
Elliot jumped. "Sir, I thought you said this was abandoned?!"
The door behind us creaked—then began to slide shut.
I lunged for the console. Hands flew across keys. A bypass code Anthony taught me failed. They likely changed it after the government split. I ripped open a cabinet instead—files fluttered.
Masked Syndicate – Protocols to Combat.
I stuffed it under my coat.
The lights went black.
Steel slammed shut behind us.