28-06-2026, 02:34 AM
IBSI HQ, near Lhasa Nevaras,
1515, February 19
1515, February 19
Quote:The bell on the elevator rang. Julian looked up... "That's different..." he thought. Few people come to 3rd Sub Basement in the Annex. His desk mate, Whitney had the day off. So he wasn't expecting anyone. As the elevator door slid open, three men in suits walked out. Two of them had sunglasses on, even though it was quite dark down here. One man, who he recognized as his boss, Agent Carl Wright, who is the lead analyst on Western Hemisphere. Julian took his feet off his desk and sat up in his chair as the trio approached.
"What the f--k is this?" asked Wright, pointing to his messy desk, stacked with files filled with onion paper sheets with intercepted communications, newspaper clippings, reports, and other detritus dealing with "Intel from South Eastern Majatra, which was Julian's expertise.
"Sir?" Julian asked, confused.
The agent looked him up and down. "Get your Solentian sh-- and come with me..." He and the two agents then headed toward the back of the office. Julian stood up slowly and started rifling through folders. Most of this stuff had to do with Istalia, or Badara, or Deltaria. Solentia was close to the top for some reason he didn't recall, but it was a fairly thin folder. He quickly scanned the document list... A new document had been added by Whitney... A few days ago.
"Let's go Rodriguez..." said Wright by the door at the back of the office. Julian quickly scanned his desk for anything else Solentia related. Seeing nothing, he brought the very thin folder with him and walked quickly to where the Wright was waiting. When he got there, Wright slid his card in the scanner, and the door opened. Julian knew what this door was for, but had never personally been through it. This was a secret briefing room. The two agents posted outside the door and closed it behind the two as they went in and sat down.
"So," said Agent Wright. "Tell me about Solentia."
The question was not strange but was entirely unexpected.
"Can I ask why?" asked Julian seeking some sort of context to be able to give Wright the information he was seeking.
"Because I told you to," said Wright matter of factly. That answer gave Julian no clue about where to start.
"Uh... Country in South east Majatra... Lots of poverty, very unstable, Primarily Ahmadi, Dudmani is the large ethnic..."
Wright rolled his eyes, "No I don't f--king care about that stuff..." Julian was at a loss, and he opened the folder looking for some clue... "Look, skip ahead a few millenia, alright? What do we know about this Hasab Warkol?" As Wright said it, Julian's eyes fell onto the small set of papers Whitney had included just a few days ago.
"Uh," said Julian, quickly scanning Whitney's scribbles in the marginalia of a report... "We... Someone posted an advertisement from them in The Republic, just about a month ago..."
Wright lit a cigarette. "I'm assuming you didn't do a proper turnover on what you are looking at there, so, I'll give you a second to collect your thoughts, Mr. Rodriguez." Julian sat down at the table, and quickly scanned the report behind the clipped advertisement which featured a Dudmani face in extreme Closeup. with the words "You will never forget us again" and "Hasab Warkol" written in Vrassan. As he read, Wright snatched the advertisement. "Yeshua, we're letting them print propaganda in our paper..."
"Well, its a free press, Sir," Julian mumbled while reading. Wright flicked the ad back at Julian, dismissively. After a moment, Julian said, "Whitney put this report in. It came from ODEN in Kaliburg. The ODEN agent, a Calloway, said he sold a Solentian guy named Rahmanai Gul... from Solentia... a large quantiy of chemicals necessary for processing Opium... Didn't ask any questions, as per usual. And he would have just treated it as a normal transaction... Except this guy, Gul, asked about firearms... Calloway informed him that ODEN didn't supply firearms, but asked him what he needed them for. Gul said that there are people in his country who want to do harm to other countries. The Agents said he said a name... Hasharbi Wakol or something like this... I assume it is this same Hasab Warkol. He said something about Dunberg, but it didn't make any sense to Calloway, who thought he was talking about Kaliburg. So the Agent asked Gul if he would be in Kalistan, because if Calloway could get a line on weapons, he would want to know where to find Gul. Gul left him an address of a contact named Dost, who is a barber in Sulari, and Dost could get messages to him. Gul left in a troller, and Calloway filed the report with ODEN."
Wright smoked as he listened, and then as it burned down, he lit another one. He was silent for a moment... "Calloway included the address for this Dost guy?"
Julian flipped the page over, and read the narrative, as well as recommendation. "Yeah, its here. But Whitney added a recommendation that she has some reason to believe that this guy Gul is a member of a group called Da Tore Lāre Tolana. It means... Uh... The Commun... no... The Society of the Black Route... This is not a name I am familiar with... Sounds like it might be smugglers, which would make sense if Gul is buying precursors and looking for guns in Kaliburg... She said the ODEN agent noticed a symbol on the ship which she said matched the Black Route symbol that we have seen before."
Wright flicked his cigarette ash... "Alright... well, here's the deal. We believe this group, the uh..."
"Society of the B..." Julian was cut off...
"No the other one..."
"Hasab Warkol..."
"Yeah... we think they are linked somehow to the Dunberg explosion that happened a few days ago. It killed a handful of people... But it was quite random. We have other desks getting similar ads in foreign papers as well, and Dunberg was one of them. Its possible Dorvik is on their radar too... Which would be as weird as a bombing in Dundorf, who makes it a point to get along with everyone. If we see another attack in Dorvik, that will be strong evidence that this Hasab Warkol is some sort of international group at large. Do we have any kind of information on them? Any chatter relating to Kalistan?"
"Just the normal stuff, 'Death to Kalistan, death to Ananto, kill the Emperor, the Consort is a whore... that kind of thing, surprisingly most of it is in Rodishayan, most of it coming from northern Keris... Not a lot of Ahmadi... though, there is one podcast which Whitney has been paying attention to recently where an Ahmadi gentleman very calmly announces God's condemnation on Kalistan and other imperialists. There doesn't seem to be any calls to action in there, just quotations from the Ahmadi Holy book..."
"No, we don't think these Solentians are particularly religious... They seem to be more about revenge for... income inequality..." said Wright. "Its kinda strange...." He paused. "You're gonna go interview Mr. Dost. Don't spook him. Bring Jackson from the arsenal."
"Sir, Jackson?"
Wright looked at Julian... "Got a problem with Jackson, Mr. Rodriguez?"
Julian paused and chose his words... "He's... inhaled too much gunpowder, sir..."
Wright answered, "He's going as a gun salesman. You need someone who knows about firearms like its his business. And anyway, you're going there to feel Mr. Dost out. See if he knows anything about Hasab Warkol, and what he knows about this Black Society group..." Julian loved how these suits thought. Human assets recruiting was not shaking someone down for tips. But he got the message, and he would go by the book.
"Clear?" asked Wright.
"Crystal," said Julian.
"And wait til your partner comes back, ok?" said Wright as he stood up. Julian stood up, and Wright walked out of the room and made a beeline for the elevator, followed by his two agent bodyguards. Julian grabbed his stuff and walked it back to his desk.
He supposed it would be better to just get it over with, and he headed off to find Jackson.
Primary: Institutionalist Party of Kalistan (IPoK), 5146-
Inactive:
Socialist Party of Kalistan (SPoK), 2591-
Inactive:
Socialist Party of Kalistan (SPoK), 2591-