(Played on 18^th August and 1^st September 2024)

From Tremen's notes¹

Section Nine

Tharbinsan gets a report emailed from the US Military about Sgt. Malory. Having been alerted to the possibility by our questions they confirm that the Brain Case currently in their possession is actually a very good copy of the original brain case. They believe that the swap of Sgt. Malory's brain case must have occured during autopsy of Sgt. Malory. The autopsy was conducted by a civilian contractor who they are now investigating. Tharbinsan requests to be kept informed of the investigation, though Tharbinsan is not convinced that he will be kept in the loop.

We are then called to Section 9's chief office ASAP to meet with the Chief himself. He informs us that a Kenbishi tank undergoing testing has gone rogue and as the pilot of the tank has an ID card identifying him as Kendo Ita it's obviously related in some way with our case. The chief informs us that the tank killed seven members of the ground crew involved in prepping the tank and we are to head out to the Kenbishi Proving Grounds immediately.

Kenbishi Proving Ground

The tank as seen by the CCTV shortly before the incident

On arrival we are met by Rochard Komashi, director of development for the tank project and we split into two teams. Myself and Spooky head to the Admin Wing while Tharbinsan, Ricky and Wakiya head to the proving ground where the tank has been covered in high performance riot foam to ensure its immobility. Only the bodies of the ground crew have been recovered before our arrival allowing Tharbinsan to do a closer examination of the undisturbed²cockpit. The pilot was slumped over the control hardware and Tharbinsan quickly determines that the cause of death was the burning, from the inside, of the pilot brain. In fact the burning was more of an explosion with the eyes having been destroyed and significant damage to the pilot's jackplugs. The evidence suggests that some kind of major electrical pulse was responsible.

Meanwhile myself and Spooky check into the background of the ground crew and the pilot. There's no sign of anything untoward in the ground crew's record and while the ID card says Kendo Ita that's not who the pilot was. Kendo Ita was, however, employed by Kenbishi but the security systems do not show any entries or exits from Kenbishi facilities since his disappearance and Spooky confirms that there is no sign of any security or cyber intrusion into Kenbishi's systems or facilities in the last seven days³.

Wakiya manages to calm one of the techs at the scene enough to ascertain that the tech has no idea how the accident occured: the tank walked out of its garage after being prepped and then turned and gunned down the ground crew. In fact when Tharbinsan reviews the data feeds about the health of the pilot there's no sign of anything unusual up to the death of the pilot. Ricky examines the locker of the pilot and confirms that the mystery continues as there nothing unusual there either.

Kendo was responsible for the failsafe programs that are part of the tank's software. All the evidence (both physical and the survelliance records) show that these failsafe programs functioned perfectly on the death of the pilot and as the tank is controlled by a virtual reality setup⁴ we meet up at the scene and ask Spooky to take a closer examination of the cockpit.

Spooky does so but is spooked when she gets both a feeling of being watched and a twitch from the body of the pilot. After some reassurance⁵ and the removal of the pilot's body Spooky re-examines the cockpit. She realises that (a) the tank is under the control of the tank's AI and its safety protocols, (b) there doesn't seem to be any malware in the tank's system, (c) that a remote network could be connected to the tank and (d) that remote network could still be connected. Spooky insulates herself from the tank's systems via a dummy barrier and then attempt to do a backtrace on any such remote network.

She gets enough information to show that there is such a signal and manages to track it as far as a Saizeniya restaurant on Rokko Island. By road that's about two hours but, after some persuasion, Kenbishi agrees to take most of the team⁶ via VTOL to the location.

Rokko Island

The Saizeriya restaurant identified by the backtrace of the network connection to the tank

On arrival at the general area of the restuarant there are workers and tourists going about their normal business. The still faint signal is actually coming from below ground and the team finds the nearest manhole cover and head down in the claustrophobic sewers below.

Marching Order

Tharbinsan has dropped his bag of medical supplies down the manhole

Ricky

Carrying a torch and pistol

Tharbinsan

Carrying a pistol

Spooky

Carrying her equipment in front of her (so initially no torch nor pistol)

Wakiya

Carrying a torch (on belt) and Pistol

On arrival at the bottom of the manhole is a small space and a door in the north of the space.