The office door slams inward. Fog spills across the threshold, and the hallway figure steps through with a sidearm shaking in their hand. Dallas stands between the terminal and the intruder, the drive heavy in his grip. Murderbone bares his teeth and lowers into a launch stance.
Elena Vane
Don’t make me shoot you, Fontaine. Hand over the drive.
Her badge is fake, but the panic is real. On the monitor, the service corridor route and review slot glow beside Rowan Mercer Holdings, linking the office to a hidden records chain. This was never just cleanup, it is the proof trail to Mercer’s buried ledger, and whoever hires Elena is trying to bury the whole harbor with it.
Dallas Fontaine
You’re late. Tell me who you’re working for, and maybe you leave breathing.
Elena Vane
If he sees the ledger, Mercer burns me. If I get the drive, I live long enough to run.
Murderbone growls, one step from the lunge. Elena’s pistol drifts toward him, then back to Dallas, measuring the room and failing to find an exit. The evidence in Dallas’s hand, the terminal on the desk, and the hidden review slot together point straight at Rowan Mercer Holdings, the name behind the harbor rot.
✓ Quest Accepted
Confront Elena Vane
✓ Quest Accepted
Learn who hired Elena Vane
“I draw her attention so murderbone can get a flank attack and when he does i tackle her.”
SUCCESS (Legendary Interrogation, rolled +1)
Dallas shifts his weight just enough to pull Elena’s aim off center. His voice stays level, his eyes stay on hers, and that is enough. Her pistol tracks him instead of Murderbone.
Murderbone explodes sideways, a dark blur under the desk light. Elena jerks late, trying to correct, but the dog is already inside her reach.
Dallas drives in with the opening, shoulder-first. Elena loses her balance on the slick floor, her back hitting the wall as her gun hand flails wide.
The pistol skitters into the fog under the desk. Murderbone plants himself between Elena and the door, teeth bared, blocking her from the hallway.
Elena Vane
Don’t, please. I can tell you what Mercer wants, just don’t let him get the drive.
Dallas pins her wrist before she can reach for anything else. The fake badge slips free and flashes once in the terminal glow, landing beside the dropped gun.
Elena Vane
He sent me to pull the evidence before the ledger reaches the auditors. Mercer, Rowan Mercer Holdings, that’s who owns this.
Quest Complete
Confront Elena Vane
Quest Complete
Learn who hired Elena Vane
“I tell her Mercer will go after her but she is too beautiful for me to let that happen. If she stays with me until this is over she will be safe. I call Jackson and have him set a place up for her. I tell her to wait there for me.”
SUCCESS (Superb Psychology, rolled +0)
Dallas Fontaine
Mercer will come for you if he thinks you can talk. Stay with me until this is over, and Jackson sets you up somewhere safe.
Dallas Fontaine
You wait there. I come get you when this breaks.
Elena Vane
You would do that, after all this?
Elena Vane
I was supposed to be a clean handoff. Then I saw the names, and I knew I was already dead if I stayed in Mercer’s pocket.
Elena Vane
He is not bluffing. He is looking at her like a witness, not a liability.
Elena Vane
Jackson Temple... he still answers his phone for you?
Her shoulders loosen a fraction as the panic drains into tired, guarded relief. Dallas gets the call through, and the answer on the other end is short, immediate, and grimly practical.
Elena Vane
All right. I will wait. Just... do not leave me with Mercer’s people again.
✓ Quest Accepted
Keep Elena Vane safe until Mercer’s people are gone