I rent another home, which is much cheaper than in Carthya, and then set up the radio to report to the HQ yet again. After another briefing it is decided that I would walk on foot to the site since it wasn’t that far away from the village. Before the mission I will have a few hours to rest and sleep, so I will first check out the village and see if there are any shops.
The village has around 30 houses in total, that sit on two intersecting streets with a square in the intersection. The houses are similar in style to Carthya ones, although most of them have only one story. There is a general store in the square which lies on the ground level of one the larger buildings.
[Welcome]
“Good Afternoon”
I greet the shopkeeper and start browsing the shelfs. Looks like they have pretty common foods here, mostly just nutrient paste and sweets. After I get everything from the list, I pay and left the building. On my way back, I notice that the village lacked any kind of temples. Could it be that these people do not believe in the Eternal Fire? I also notice a strange building decorated with dragon symbols, maybe it is a souvenir shop or something, but this area shouldn't get any tourism…
Anyway, time to rest a bit and then plan my intrusion. I head back to my room and go to bed for a quick nap. I set my alarm and quickly fall asleep.
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Waking up to the alarm, I quickly get up and go to shower. It might be a long time before I sleep and shower again. After that I prepare my gun and tools and I am ready to go. I get another suitcase where the SynthCo uniform, which I obtained prior to this mission, is. It will be useful for infiltration once I steal the documentation of the first guard I spot.
I leave the building and start walking through the deep snow towards my objective. The site is located about three clicks east and comparatively small on the outside. It should be just a railway station, a parking lot and the entrance gate drilled into a nearby hill. The railway is used by the military so I couldn’t have taken it to get there, the mixed transportation was my best choice.
It took me a good hour or two to get through the snow covered road to get to this place, and I am still to see where the entrance is. I find a branching in the road, it is probably the road to the site as there is a vehicle trail coming this way. I take a turn left to go even deeper in the woods. The sky is totally blocked by branches with a meter of snow stacked on top and the road seems freshly asphalted.
After walking for an additional 15 minutes, I spot the entrance. It has more defenses than in the intel I got from the HQ. New concrete walls have been erected all around the primary compound and watchtowers have been built on the flanking sides. A guard hut has been placed next to the road with a ramp. There are even additional fences with barbed wire. It seems that something very serious is happening in this site judging by the layers of defense for something so deep inside their territory.
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I quickly see a blindspot somewhere on the right side near the wall. There I unpack and grab my silenced pistol. The tactic is simple: eliminate the guards in the watchtowers and climb over the wall. Thankfully, the walls have metal bumps on them, probably for easier transportation.
My first target is the opposite watchtower. Thankfully, the watchtowers have their windows open and I don’t need to worry about the sound of glass shattering. I put the 4x sight on my pistol and aim steadily, knowing that I have only one chance to strike. I pull the trigger and the guard collapses without alerting anyone else.
Now I make it to the other side of the compound and do the same procedure for the other watchtower. Again, the guard just collapses without alerting others. Now I climb over the wall and land just behind a parked ATV on the lot. I enter through the back door and change my clothes in the comparatively hot inside. Looks like it was driven here very recently and that the trail I found earlier was made by it.
After dressing up, I climb the watchtower to pick up valuables from the guard. The first thing I see is their new Particle Rifle model. They still make those? I thought they were useless in the war. I pick it up nonetheless as it is the best gun I can have right now. I also got his knife and any documentation he had on him.
After looting his corpse, I climb down and scout a bit more on the outside for valuable information. The only thing I can observe is that the main gate is closed. It looks like there is a bulkhead door right next to it for personnel, but I need to speak to the guard on the gate. The main structure looks to be made out of reinforced concrete and the door is made out of some sort of metal alloy as it doesn’t look like steel on the first glance.
Taking all things into consideration, I walk up to the guard.
“Hey, can you open the door please?”
[Sure thing, looks like someone’s got too cold. Ask someone to replace you in your position.]
“I’ll be back in a moment, surely nothing bad can happen for a few minutes.”
[I guess, but be quick.]
I hear the noise of the heavy door opening, it must be very heavy. I finally entered the compound.
“Are the toilets to the right?”
[No, they are to the left. How could you have forgotten that? It’s already your second day here!]
“My bad, I’ll try to memorize the layout next time.”
I quickly go to the toilets so as to not raise any alarms. Although the guard doesn’t see me as suspicious, I can never be too careful. Once in the toilet, I take off the mask and goggles and wash my face up with warm water. It’s freezing outside and the protection provided doesn’t help one bit. After I’ve warmed up, I change out the picture on that guard’s card and papers to my face in uniform. Thankfully, I have these stickers which look authentic once a few minutes pass.
After waiting a couple of minutes for my falsified documents to look authentic, I exit the bathroom and I start looking for a general floor layout. I found it in an adjacent corridor. So the first floor is approximately a T shape, corridor wise, where in the left corridor, there are bathrooms and a mess hall which seems to be closed, judging by the closed rolling doors, and the janitor’s room along with a tiny corridor where I currently am. The right wing consists of the security office, which is where that clueless guard was, the guard barracks and the armory.
The main corridor is a spacious one which leads to the large cargo elevator. There are also stairs on the right side which I will take to not attract unwanted attention. I need to head there when the guard is not looking. After a minute or so, the guard finally shifted his focus to the outside and I headed for the staircase at the end of the long tunnel. It was now time to descend into lower levels of the site and to uncover what is SynthCo hiding down there.