the vanderwood route.

prologue.

Unknown: Are you there? See, nothing strange.

MC scanned the apartment building's third floor around her and shrugged. "I guess," she mumbled to herself, then reached for the door handle.

"Who the hell are you?" MC turned on her heels, eyes wide.

Someone tall and imposing who was definitely not there two seconds ago stood before her with their arms crossed, a look of clear annoyance on their face.

The person sighed. "Did Oh Seven send you as a decoy or something? How much did he pay you just to play a stupid prank on me?"

MC felt her phone vibrate in her pocket a few times, but decided that this spy movie villan looking individual in front of her was a slightly more pressing matter. "Pay me? What... Where did you even come from, dude?"

With a roll of their eyes, they continued, "Nice. Look, can you just tell me where he is? Did he even tell you? I do have shit to do besides babysit the little freak, you know."

MC blinked. "He who? What the hell are you talking about? I just came here to return something."

Suddenly, the stranger's eyes widened. "Oh, you have got to be kidding me."

MC just stared.

____________

Vanderwood laughed bitterly to themself.

Of course a random civilian would trip Zero Seven's motion sensors at some random apartment minutes after he'd decided to sneak out somewhere. Of course. The dumbass probably just went to get more weird soda or something, why did they always overreact when it came to that guy?

Because that's half your job now, they thought to themself. Jesus Christ. The bastard was probably already home at that point, they might as well just leave.

But what the fuck was Vanderwood supposed to do about this civilian?

They looked her over. She was kind of small, long hair, probably around their age, maybe a bit younger. Cute, but that wasn't really the issue right now.

"Are you seriously checking me out right now?" She spoke, shaking them from their thoughts.

"What?! No, God. Just. I have no idea what to do with you," they said truthfully.

The chick raised an eyebrow. "Um, what?"

"Oh. Yeah, I can't exactly let you just leave. I don't know about you, you might be dangerous. And if I know anything about Oh Seven, you probably aren't supposed to see this place either... Damn. I'll probably have to take you back to the boss, hold on." Vanderwood got their phone out of their pocket and reluctantly called their superior.

____________

MC gaped blankly - holy shit, was this person actually a spy movie villain?

Holy shit. No, nope, not today. She took a quiet deep breath and made a mad dash for the elevator.

At least, she started to. She got about six feet down the hall before she was pulled back by the collar of her shirt.

Her captor turned her around and used the hand holding their still ringing phone to restrain her while the other reached for something in their belt. Shit.

"Sorry about this," they said sincerely.

Before she could reply, she jerked violently, and then everything went black.

____________

"Hey, boss?" Vanderwood said after the line picked up. They looked down at the girl again, passed out against the wall. "Yeah, I've kinda got a problem."