MISSION BRIEFING
Take a seat, Captain. You'll want to read this through before you sign for the gear.
Captain Sahel Kohl, by the time this brief ends you'll be wheels-down at Ravenhold Containment Site Theta-9, a Department of Defense black site in the Cascade foothills. You are Internal Affairs. Your authority for the next six hours runs through me, through the IG's office, through the Secretary's signature on the warrant in your jacket pocket. You outrank every uniform inside that bunker tonight, regardless of seniority, because you are the only officer present operating under direct civilian oversight authority. Use it carefully. Lose it permanently if you abuse it.
▣ THE OFFICIAL STORY
At 0347 hours tonight, Theta-9 went to red alert. The site reports a containment breach in the Research Wing — a specimen escaped its tank, killed two technicians, and the facility commander, Major Rell Thorvin, ordered Command Sector Black sealed to protect the data vault. The breach is contained. Casualties are minimal. You're being sent in to write the after-action report so the IG can close the file by Friday. Routine. Boring. Five-hour turnaround.
▼ WHAT I'M TELLING YOU OFF THE RECORD
Sahel — listen. A friend of mine in the IG's office, somebody who was on the original Theta-9 oversight team in 2024, called me at home last night. She said an inspector named Daniel Reyes went into Theta-9 eleven days ago for a routine audit and never came back out. The site logged him as "departed by ground transport." She checked the gate cameras. He never left. Then she said something I want you to hear in my voice, not read in a file: "That place isn't holding specimens, Ines. It's holding people." She wouldn't say more. Two days later her clearance was suspended pending review. So when you walk in there tonight and the official story doesn't add up, trust the gap. The gap is the mission.
▣ HOW THIS WORKS
Theta-9 has fourteen rooms. You'll move through them by selecting glowing waypoints on the map. Each room presents a scenario with five courses of action. There is no obvious "right" answer — every choice has a cost, and the costs compound. Read the scenarios carefully. The details that look like atmosphere are sometimes the lead. The details that look like leads are sometimes atmosphere. That distinction is the work.
After every decision you'll receive a debrief — what happened in the room, what a worse choice would've cost, what a better one might've earned, and a reflection question to take back to your unit. Three rooms also carry their own thirty-second tactical timers. Hit the 📖 LEADERSHIP LESSON button in any debrief to pause everything and read the doctrine in play — Boyd's OODA loop, Mission Command, Stockdale Paradox, others. The mission clock pauses while you read.
From the moment you click the first waypoint, you have thirty minutes. The clock does not stop for scenarios, debriefs, or hesitation. It only stops when you open a leadership lesson. Move with purpose. Quick decisions are the point. Quick stupid decisions are not. Find the line.
If at any point you feel the mission is unrecoverable, you may abort using the ⚠ SELF-DESTRUCT button in the top bar. There is no shame in the abort. There is shame in dragging your team through a collapse you saw coming. Decide accordingly.
▣ INTENT
Establish what actually happened at Theta-9 tonight. Preserve the evidence. Protect the soldiers who followed orders in good faith from the officers who gave them in bad faith. If Daniel Reyes is alive in that building, find him. If he is not, document what was done to him. The truth is the mission. Everything else is logistics.
When you launch, only one waypoint will glow blue: [1] Security Checkpoint. That's your insertion point. Sgt. Mira Doss is waiting. From there the map opens up as you clear rooms — neighboring waypoints unlock, the rest stay locked behind grayscale until you reach them.
Good hunting, Captain. The clock starts when you do.
RAVENHOLD CONTAINMENT SITE THETA-9
