[Lauchenoiria]

Irene’s flatmate Sofia found her on the doorstep shortly after. She’d been sick, and Sofia assumed she’d been out drinking.

“You vanish for two weeks and then come back like this!” Sofia laughed in mock outrage. “I assume you got arrested in the WOE raids and the lot of you went out drinking after you were released. Did you lose your keys?”

Irene turned to look at Sofia, barely hearing her. When Sofia saw the look on her flatmate’s face, she quickly stopped laughing. Irene looked not like she’d seen a ghost, but like she was one.

“Irene? Are you okay? What happened?” Sofia asked, suddenly concerned.

Irene burst into tears, inconsolable. Sofia helped her up and into their flat, making her a cup of tea and waiting for her to calm down enough to ask her what had happened.

“It wasn’t… it wasn’t the police,” she sobbed. “The… the… the Xiomerans, they…”

“Xiomerans?” Sofia responded as Irene collapsed into sobs once more. “What about the Xiomerans?”

Wordlessly, Irene showed her flatmate the tattoos. Sofia, who’d studied a little bit of Huenyan in an evening class for extra credit, gasped. “Oh my god, Irene! We… we have to call the police! Or, like, the army? Jesus…”

*

Clay, meanwhile, immediately went inside his own flat and picked up a smartphone from a pile of them by the door. Yes, he kept spares. He plugged it into a charger and as soon as it was turned on, he took pictures of himself, making sure the camera angle exaggerated any of the injuries Mariya had inflicted before the Empress stopped her. Once he’d taken his grisly photos, he uploaded them to seven different social media platforms.

“Hey everyone, I know I haven’t been online much recently and you are NOT going to believe why. I was KIDNAPPED BY XIOMERANS because I’m in WOE! They had their little Kerlian demon TORTURE ME. You can see the proof! Guys, if you’re in WOE you need to be super careful; the Xiomerans are out to get us, and Lauchenoiria is powerless against them! Nowhere is safe, nobody is safe!”

The post quickly went viral, especially with the accompanying pictures. It quickly came to the attention of the LDSS, who had been searching for Clay in their attempted clampdown on WOE. The nature of the allegations, and the pictures, meant it quickly rose through the ranks to land on the Prime Minister’s desk.

*

“Xiomera did what!?” Alvarez shouted. “Is this… is this real?”

“Unfortunately, yes,” Jae Chung, who’d been dispatched to brief Alvarez, replied. “And it’s not only him. A call to a local police department in Buttercity was intercepted by the flatmate of a second Watchdog who alleged the same thing. Similar scars, same tattoos. We are extremely confident that this is no hoax.”

“Calhualyana thinks she can do whatever she wants!” Alvarez growled. “She sends her goons here to kidnap our citizens on our soil. I won’t stand for it! But, Jae, tell me honestly, are they Watchdogs or Warriors?”

“One of each,” Jae responded. “Clay was among the list of those we were searching for to question about Warriors; we assumed he was in hiding for the past fortnight. Apparently not. The other, a woman called Irene Ramos, seems to have no specific connection to Warriors beyond that of any Watchdog.”

“I want to see the girl,” Alvarez commanded. “If she has no connection to Warriors. Given the situation, I can’t be seen to meet with this Clay figure, but if the girl is non-violent, I want to hear her story directly. In the meantime, I am going to convene the cabinet to discuss our response to Xiomera. I will not stand for this,” she repeated, shaking her head. “I will NOT stand for this."