Running out of time

Part 15 - Broken Masquerade

Location: Site-17, United States of America, Chaos Insurgency’s base

Date: 16th-17th  April 2022

Your POV:
It has been a week since Olivia’s disappearance, and nobody in the entire Foundation knew where she could be. We have been calling to other facilities, hoping to find any clue where she could have gone, but ultimately we haven’t found anything. We went to 343’s cell, because we knew they were good friends, but surprisingly she wasn’t there either. Video recording from cameras revealed she went there earlier, but then teleported away, while 343 didn’t want to tell us where she was.

After informing the O5 council about everything, they told us to come to the conference room at 5 p.m., where they would make their final decision about the current situation. Filled with anxiety we entered the room, where we found the same squad of Alpha-1 as one week ago, but this time there was also a television, a microphone, and a video camera, but for now, they were all turned off. We sat down, while O5-8 stood up and spoke to all of us:

- Welcome everyone. As you already know, O5-4 wanted to organize this meeting, so without prolonging this, I will let him speak.

- Thank you Eight. As you already know, Olivia disappeared without a trace from all of our facilities, and she is currently out of our reach. I believe she is mentally preparing to sacrifice all of us in case of the worst scenario, however we have to remember that she is a daughter of the Scarlet King, who was able to possess her once already.

- I think now she would be able to fight him though, as she has managed to understand her powers already.

- You are correct Cain, but we cannot exclude this possibility. Because of that, I believe our time in this world is limited, and I would like to use the full potential of our organization.

- Don’t we already have the power to do whatever we want Four? – One of council members asked while looking at him.

- No, as there are other organizations, which sometimes are as powerful as us. Furthermore, our human potential is limited, even if we decide to use clones, which are already expensive for us.

- What would you like to do then? – I asked Kondraki while soldiers around us were asking each other what he was planning.

- I... – He stuttered for a moment. – I would like to perform the Broken Masquerade Scenario.

- You cannot be serious Kondraki, even I wouldn’t think about that.

- Do you see any other choice Bright? This world is ending, our universe is coming to an end, and we cannot do anything about that. I also cannot believe I am saying this, but we have to tell people the truth, and start co-operating with organizations like Chaos Insurgency or Church of the Broken God, in order to have a chance to fulfil our goal.

- I doubt Chaos will agree to work with us. Church of the Broken God maybe, but there is no chance those, who hate us the most will be willing to co-operate with us.

- We have to try it Gears, we have to put all of our eggs in one basket, or else we won’t even have a tombstone after our death!

- Excuse me that I am interrupting you, but what exactly is the Broken Masquerade? – Myung-Ok asked the council with curiosity, before any of us had a chance to do it.

- Broken Masquerade is a scenario, where we, as the Foundation, reveal our existence to the entire world, and release some SCPs to the public, as our mission of preventing the world from knowing about anomalies will be over.

- The entire society will freak out when they hear about this! – Abel said jokingly.

- If this was supposed to be a joke, then I have to inform you it is absolutely correct. While some people might be calm and peaceful about this, maybe even happy, others will go crazy, as everything they knew until now was a lie.