T-002 Rift stalker

Threshold Institute · Case file T-002

Number

T-002 in the catalogue

Kind

Creature

Class

Class II: dangerous, and held in a cell

Found

Year 1, month 4, day 17

Where found

The anteroom of the containment chamber, at night

Status

Escaped

Now

At the lab and in the rift

Part

Part I: The tear

Containment procedures

Each T-002 is held in a sealed cell on the sealed level under constant light, from at least two lamps on separate lines. A cell whose lamps fail is treated as breached. Staff never turn their back on a T-002, in its cell or out of it, and never stand at a cell's window alone. The anteroom of the chamber is lit day and night, and the generators that feed it are doubled.

Description

A fast and frail creature, about the height of a person, that keeps to the dark and comes up at night. When it hunts it blinks: it flickers, vanishes and reappears a few floor tiles closer, and again, until it is close enough to strike. It is put down by a few rounds. T-002s came through T-001 one or two a season in the Institute's first decades, and the cell block on the sealed level grew by one cell at a time to hold them.

Discovery

T-001's tracks (see T-001) told the Institute that something came and went. The first guards of the sealed level were a detachment of the state's own soldiers, and they stood their watch in the anteroom with the work lights switched off at night to spare the generators. On the hundred and seventh night of the calendar Corporal Mara Okafor saw a figure cross the dark between two lamps faster than it could have walked. She fired, and it was not there. It was four tiles closer. It came for her twice more before dawn, each time from the dark, each time nearer, and her third round brought it down. It was still alive when the day shift came. Okafor's report gave the guards their first standing order: never turn your back on one. That summer Director Varga formed the response team, eight guards trained for one thing, what came out of the chamber, and gave it to Okafor.

Addenda

Addendum T-002-A

incident log, Year 1, month 4, day 17, kept by Corporal M. Okafor

23:52. Anteroom work lights off as ordered. Two hand lamps lit. Movement at the chamber door, left of the lamps.

23:52. One shot fired. Target not hit. Target not where it was. Target closer, four tiles, by the north wall.

00:31. Second approach from the dark side. It flickered. I saw it go out like a bulb and come on again nearer. Two shots, one hit.

03:10. Third approach. One shot, hit. It went down by the door. It is breathing. I am not turning my back on it to write this.

06:00. Day shift relieved me. Request that the work lights stay on at night. Request a second lamp per guard.

Addendum T-002-B

note, Director I. Varga, Year 1, month 5, day 2

Both requests granted. The specimen died in its cell in the third week, under the lamps; the second one, caught that autumn, lived for years. The cells were built to T-002's size. The next thing through T-001 did not fit them (see T-003).

Previous fileT-001 The riftPart I: The tear Next fileT-003 Rift brutePart I: The tear

In the file

• People: Director Ilse Varga and Mara Okafor.
• Places: The containment chamber, The sealed level and The cells.

In the game

The note you find in the game:

Year 1, month 4, day 17. Caught at the mouth of T-001, in the anteroom of the containment chamber at night, after the tracks in the cavity had told us that something came and went. Corporal Mara Okafor of the first guard saw it cross the dark between two lamps faster than it could walk; it came for her three times, each time nearer, and her third round brought it down.

Fast and frail; it keeps to the dark and comes up at night.

When it hunts it blinks: it flickers, vanishes and reappears a few floor tiles closer. Never turn your back on one.

Held in a sealed cell under constant light. Status: escaped.

Today it is found at the lab and in the rift.

It goes down after losing 1400 ml of its 4000 ml of blood. How it hunts and where it turns up: see the zombies page.