The cramped apartment feels smaller with The Rose and Mark V inside it. Mark V kneels by the baseboard Sally shattered, his chest lights faintly humming as he traces the burnt wiring.
Mark V
This is not a simple camera feed. It is a relay node, proprietary Department hardware.
He pries the panel wider. Inside, a red trace pulses once, like a heartbeat answering him.
The Rose
That signature is familiar. We used to see it on weapon trials, back when the Department still pretended those files were sealed.
Sally
It was never just watching. It was reaching into the room.
Mark V tilts his head, reading the surge in the wall. The hidden line flares brighter, then dims, as if something far away has noticed the breach.
Mark V
The apartment was mapped to a testing protocol. Not surveillance for observation, surveillance for control.
The Rose
Sally, if they built this into the walls, they may have been using the signal to monitor your responses, maybe even trigger them.
The red glow dies in the exposed wiring, leaving only the burnt smell and a hard silence. Mark V holds the panel open, waiting for Sally to decide whether to pull the next wire or ask the question hanging in the room.
✓ Quest Accepted
Understand how the Department is accessing Sally remotely
✓ Quest Accepted
Shut down the Department's control signal
“"If they are co trolling me we have to stop them!" I ask Mark V to trace the signal's path back to its source.”
SUCCESS (Mediocre Science, rolled +2)
Sally
If they are controlling me, we have to stop them. Trace it back to the source.
Mark V nods once and plugs a slim probe into the exposed bundle. His chest lights shift as his eyes track the signal's ghost through the wall and into the building grid.
Mark V
There. The relay is not local. It is hopping through a Department address in the city records network.
The Rose straightens from the wall, watching the numbers climb across Mark V's display. The burnt wiring gives off one last hiss, then settles into dead black.
The Rose
So the apartment was only the endpoint. They were steering her through a buried control path.
Mark V reroutes the probe and a crude map blooms from the signal trail, branching from the apartment to a sealed Department node under Front Street.
Mark V
Source located. This is the control node they are using to reach Sally remotely.
The red trace goes dark on his screen, but the room still feels watched. The Rose glances from the map to Sally, waiting for her next move.
Quest Complete
Understand how the Department is accessing Sally remotely
Quest Complete
Shut down the Department's control signal