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1
2“Why, you may take the most gallant sailor, the most intrepid airman or the most audacious soldier, put them at a table together — what do you get? The sum of their fears.”
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4Winston Churchill
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6=======================================
7
8<<Rossartrist Monthly>> __ __th, 207__
9<<Development of Relic Weapons During the Cold War>>
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11The term “Relic weapon” refers to weapons that directly use Relic technology or weapons derived from secondary applications thereof. During the 36 years from World War II in 1945 until 1981, when the US and USSR signed the Relic Arms Limitation Treaty, both superpowers had manufactured enough Relic weapons to destroy the world dozens of times over.
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13To date, all manufactured Relic weapons have been sealed away or destroyed.
14However, mankind has already opened Pandora’s Box. 
15It is hard to tell whether some day in the future, Relic weapons might end up being considered for use once more.
16But we know one thing very well.
17Once these Relic weapons are used again, humanity will cease to exist.
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19Chapter 1: The Era Before Relic Weapon Development
20
21Humanity is no stranger to the Relic civilization. Mankind had already excavated a series of Relics in Tsarist Russia, early in the 20th century, but Tsarist Russia lacked the ability to further research and develop  the abilities of the Relics. As the Russian Revolution and World War I broke out, until the end of the 20s when the Soviet Union’s reign had gradually stabilized, the Kremlin gradually began resuming their exploration of the Relics. However, the brief Soviet foray into Relic technology ground to a halt as the international situation worsened and the Great Purge began. 
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23At the same time, the occult-obsessed Third Reich’s Organization Todt excavated a Relic in the Nordhausen region near Leipzig. This item, known as the First Relic (Urkunde-01) was the foundation of all Soviet Relic weapons, and the Germans’ advanced technology gave them the ability to research the Relic. They soon discovered that it was a kind of production facility, one that contained many dangerous, unknown substances. They drilled open some of the crystal capsules excavated from the First Relic and brought an annihilatory disaster upon themselves -- the high-density Collapse Fluid triggered a detonation and reduced several research facilities near the First Relic to ashes. During this accident, Dr. Josef Mengele, infamously known as “the Angel of Death” discovered that the contents of these capsules could induce a dangerous disease, but the Third Reich’s high command dismissed his reports. After the war against Poland began, the importance placed on the First Relic decreased by the day. By the end of WW2, the First Relic became a large piece of cover for the Third Reich, and the data on the German nuclear weapons program and V-type missiles were stored there.
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25Chapter 1: The Era of Early Relic Weapon Development (1945-1961)
26
27The Soviets had already learned of the existence of the First Relic in 1943 from questioning POWs. As the war wound down, the Soviet special unit “Russian Alsos” moved quickly to secure the First Relic, transporting it and the data pertaining within it into the Soviet Union. There is no denying that Soviet Relic technology was built on the foundation laid by the Germans. The Third Reich’s nuclear weapon program data within the First Relic and insiders from across the Atlantic hastened the progress of Soviet nuclear weapons development, while the information on the V-type missiles hastened the progress of Russian aerospace engineering. But the most critical contribution came from the surrender of Josef Mengele. His testimony allowed the Soviets to understand the danger of Collapse Fluid within Relics for the first time.
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29In 1947, the Truman Doctrine raised the curtain on the Cold War. As the international situation grew tense, the Kremlin increased their investment into nuclear, aerospace and Relic technology. Standing on the bedrock of the First Relic, a few short years of Soviet investment yielded lavish rewards. As the Americans spent money and time on designing gigantic bombers (the G-36) and aircraft carriers (the United States-class), the Soviets had already set their eyes on the next era; while the American Redstone and Jupiter ballistic missiles only had a range of several hundred kilometers, the Russian R-5 missile had a range of over 1000 kilometers.The remains of the flying machine wreckage excavated from Relic OKB-456 became a perfect sample for the Almaz-Antey design bureau, allowing Soviet anti-air missile technology to easily leave the Americans in the dust. But the greatest developments still lay in the Relics themselves, such as the breakthrough in Tabasar-B -- where materials brought back from the First Relic had used electronic computers to repair themselves and then proceeded to devour their surroundings by some unknown mechanism. The characteristics of these materials which led them to consume everything around them could be said to make them the ultimate weapon, but at the same time the Soviets still lacked the ability to elucidate themselves on the principles behind the phenomenon.
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31But soon, they would reap a bountiful harvest from their investment into Relic technology. 
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33The advances in Soviet weapons technology made Washington anxious, with the appearance of these new weapons turning America’s vast and splendid conventional forces into a laughingstock and leaving them in an unfavorable position during the Cold War. But soon, the riddle was solved. In 1955, as the Eastern European countries signed the Warsaw Pact and caused ructions within the countries, the West took advantage of this confusion and had their spies infiltrate, which was when they learned of the existence of Tabasar-B. In response to the speed of Soviet Relic technology development and the surprise discovery of Relic D-1 within American borders, Washington set up its own Relic research organization in short order -- ARPA. That said, the Soviets kept seizing the initiative during the early stages of the Cold War, be it in putting the first man-made satellite into orbit or successfully shooting down high altitude U-2 spy planes with SA-2 guided missiles. Of course, the Americans did not come away empty-handed. After multiple high-altitude surveillance sweeps, they learned of the “Starfish” facility at Tabasar-B. With the threat of Soviet Relic technology as an inducement, the White House succeeded in forcing their European allies to station “Thor” and “Jupiter” short-range nuclear ballistic missiles within their borders, as well as “blackmailing” funding from Capitol Hill to found ARPA (Advanced Research Projects Agency). At the same time, faced with the American response, the Kremlin made the appropriate adjustments -- they increased the funding to Tabasar-B. The newly founded 16th Directorate of the KGB and the latest model of ternary-logic computer “Сетунь” (Setun) were deployed to Tabasar-B, which would also become the foundation for their later dominance over the development of Relic weapons. 
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35On the 28th of January, 1961, the Tabasar-B Starfish automatically produced a group of moving objects of unknown makeup. These moving objects appeared to be some kind of lifeform, but its structure seemed closer to that of a machine. When placed within a shielded room full of Collapse Fluid, these unknown moving objects would consume it all, while simultaneously decomposing metal objects into pure, mono-elemental powder. The Moscow State University named these objects “Идиот” (Moron). 
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37They were the perfect weapons that the Kremlin sought.
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39=======================================
40
41File Number “Soviet-N2-TS”
42Type: Political Figure Data
43Classification: [Confidential]
44Source [___]
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46Director of the KGB 16th Directorate (Department of Relic Research and Protection)
47Recipient of the Order of the Red Star, Hero of Socialist Labor, the Order of Lenin, Russian Federation State Special Allowance Recipient
48Mikhail Semenovich Tsvigun (Цвигун,Михаил Семёнович, 1953.3.4 -- ) 
49
50Mikhail Tsvigun is the youngest head of a directorate in the KGB’s history, and also the last head of the Soviet Union’s 16th Directorate. A Russian national, he was born on March 4th, 1951 in Chisinau, the capital of Moldova (now known as Kishinev). The young Mikhail followed his family members from the KGB in circulating through the various republics, and to date no full personal history exists. Currently, all we know is that he once worked in Tass and studied in Baku. After graduating from 11 years of standardized education, it was only natural that Mikhail enter the Dzerzhinsky Higher School of the KGB to study encryption.
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52In 1973 (the exact date is unclear), the loss of contact with OKB-10 led the KGB to select a batch of newcomers to fill out the 16th Directorate, and Mikhail was among them. Due to the twin accolades of his outstanding professional ability and his family background, Mikhail rose swiftly through the ranks in the 16th Directorate. After becoming the Director’s assistant in 1976, Mikhail came into contact with many core secrets, but the secrecy work that he was in charge of never once leaked anything. Though people secretly called him “Locksmith” and other such nicknames in private, everyone only ever called him “Misha” in public. Even in the 80s, when he had become someone that younger people would address like a father, he insisted on being addressed in the diminutive, in an informal manner, supposedly to make himself seem younger. In 1981, Mikhail adopted the identity of the technical expert Borikin and directed a special operation in the Khyber Pass, for which he earned the Order of the Red Star.
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54In 1982, Mikhail’s father and Suslov -- who admired his abilities -- both passed away, resulting in him losing both his backers at once. However, Andropov placed a great deal of trust in him, and even favored him more than the Director of the 16th at the time. At the end of December 1983, he gained his colonel’s bars at the incredible age of 32 and became the head of the 16th Directorate. His military rank was the lowest of that of any Director in history, being that most Directors had to be major-generals at the minimum, and so his feat earned him much envy among his students -- and much jealousy. However, due to the influence of the Geneva Gazette in 1983, devices related to Relic technology were steadily sealed away or abandoned from 1983 to 1984, and the OGAS system was converted to non-military uses. Mikhail drafted a plan to separate the OGAS platform from the peripheral automated subsystems that concerned the state economy, and to that end, OGAS came to be known as the “National Economy Automation System” among latter-day academics, in place of its original implications, thus becoming an autonomously operating economic processing economy management system founded on earth sciences.
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56In the late 1980s, the loss of support from the parent OGAS system led to difficulties in applying iterative upgrades required for the demilitarization of peripheral application systems, which in turn caused a chain reaction that was compounded by the simultaneous global crises of ELID and oil, leading to instabilities in the political and economic operations of the Soviet Union. During this time, Mikhail devoted all his efforts to dealing with the ELID problem, while at the same time the 16th Directorate focused on making OGAS accessible to the entire populace. According to part of the notes from the OGAS project’s technical director Glushkov, we can conclude that at the time, Mikhail and the central committee of the CPSU felt that the practical use of this system could revolutionize statewide economic planning efficiency and serve as a breakthrough point for revolutionizing political structure, and for that reason, even after the entire globe began to react with fear to Relic technology, Mikhail used all the resources he could get his hands on to back the system up and prepare it for being powered down and sealed away. On March 31st 1991, after the UN passed the <<Relic Technology Convention>>, MIkhail exerted every effort to delay the sealing date and did all that he could to protect the legacy of the Soviet Union’s dozens of years of Relic development. However, even that could not halt the ambitions of the Russian Federation’s oligarchs, and finally, on 19th August 1991, the country formerly known as the Soviet Union lowered its flag at last, to the sound of gunfire. After the oligarchs and the government investors had enjoyed their massive gains, Relic technology and its associated problems was the last thing they were thinking about, and Mikhail soon went from one of the hottest men in the agency to a head of a near-defunct department. By 1993, as the whole world began to show interest in Relic technology once more, Mikhail started to grow popular again. However, in a completely unexpected move, Mikhail insisted on quitting his position and boldly returned to his alma mater to teach. However, the truth was that his successors were all young people that Mikhail had personally raised, and so even though Mikhail was languishing in a school, he still had a hand in all the major business that took place. On 10th August 1999, after Putin became Prime Minister, he called Mikhail Tsvigun the next day to ask him Relic-related questions. While the exact content is unknown, the Russian Federation maintained an attitude of calm and restraint during the Relic Bubble from 1999 - 2001, and even the Western and the Japanese mocked them for not being able to do business.
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58During the turmoil-filled first ten years of the 21st century, Mikhail -- a mere 50 years old -- did his best to disguise himself as a pedagogue without any ambitions, teaching classes on encryption to young people in the FSB Academy. Some of his similarly-aged colleagues discovered an abnormal change in him; Mikhail was aging slower than others. In the end, Mikhail had no choice but to think of some way to disguise himself to look as old as he was. However, from what we know, he still had not completely backed out of the Relic Business after retiring in 2012, instead looking for a true successor for himself. Of course, he did not find anyone among his students.
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60In 2022, Mikhail accepted an invitation to the Poznan University to take part in a discussion related to Relic research. In the audience, he met a mathematics student from the University of Warsaw, who brought up a question related to ternary logic research. After the event, this university student approached him with several manuscripts and collected data to ask him to talk about the matter at the Khyber Pass, and Mikhail was shocked to find that this person had, using only publicly available information and a few rumors, had managed to work backwards and gain a rough idea of the full picture of what had happened that year. That person would later become the head of the new Soviet Union’s Cabinet, Viktor Pavlovich Zelinsky. The two of them forged an extraordinary friendship, to the point where one could consider them father and son (Mikhail’s children had gone to live with their mother after he had divorced, and changed their surnames. It would seem he had encouraged his children to do so). It is unclear exactly what Zelinsky learned from Mikhail, but everyone is familiar with what happened in 2030.  
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62In 2030, the aged MIkhail refused an invitation from the Russian Federal government and did not come out to head the cleanup work in the wake of the Beilan Island Incident. All he did was hand part of his usable data to the government. Of course, the New Soviet Communist movement were subjected to a more complete set of information than the Russian Federation had. While the Russian Federation’s oligarchs and powerhouses were staggering around aimlessly, the New Soviet Communists had begun using the Internet to motivate the masses into helping themselves, even going so far as to supplant or annex the federal Ministry of Emergency Situations and take charge of disaster relief operations. After the rescues were over, the various powerful institutions of the Russian Federation began exerting comprehensive pressure on the Neo-Soviets, but that elicited an unexpected reaction: a revolution was brewing. Soon, with Mikhail’s support, Zelinsky used the political power of the Soviet Communists to neatly quash all anti-Bolshevik plots. After the majority of the army and the various institutions of the government saw the writing on the wall and declared for the Bolsheviks, they had won the brief civil war and allowed the Soviet Union to be rebuilt atop the rubble of the Russian Federation. However, after the Battle of Minsk in March 2023, nobody saw Mikhail in Moscow again. He stopped drawing his pension in April 2032. However, according to records from the Soviet Armed Forces’ Central Archives, at the beginning of February 2032, someone saw an old man wearing the rank of lieutenant-general of the National Guard at the Chasniki Frontline Command centre, walking in and out under the eyes of seemingly unconcerned guards. He looked old, but walked without any difficulty. 
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64
65=======================================
66
67Chapter 3: The Mid-Term Era of Relic Weapon Development (1961-1974) 
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691961 was a tumultuous year, fraught with unease. In January, the US had just severed diplomatic ties with the Castro regime of Cuba, , and in April the CIA desperately scrabbled Cuban mercenaries together to counterattack Cuba -- and proceeded to disgrace themselves in front of the entire world. However, the failure in Cuba did not convince Washington to relent. After sending special forces teams into Vietnam and enthusiastically exhibiting the “Apollo” program (to land on the Moon), they held the Vienna Summit in June, where the supreme leaders of the US and the USSR spoke and parted on bad terms. In terms of Relic weapons, the unexpected arrival of “Идиот” (Moron) was a potent “trump card” for the Kremlin, but they could only win this game of chicken if they played the card at the right time. After the July suspension of recovery, the third Berlin crisis of August and the resumption of nuclear testing, Khrushchev decided to play that card against the United States -- the Soviet Union’s proud unveiling of “Moron” during the October Revolution Parade instantly doused the fires of Washington’s arrogance. The next day, Kennedy announced that he was abandoning the Apollo program and divert the budget into exploring the “Relic civilization”, but time was not on the Americans’ side.
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71On June 22nd 1962, once tests of the prototype ternary logic control bus prototype “Емеля-1” (Emelya-1) proved successful, the Kremlin was the undisputed winner of this round. After meeting with Castro, the Soviets not only shipped anti-air missiles and new fighter models to Cuba, they also stationed the recently-tested “Moron” there. In the ensuing Cuban Moron Crisis, the American government -- which suffered from a lack of information regarding Relic technology -- was forced to withdraw their nuclear warheads from Europe in exchange for the Soviets removing “Moron” from Cuba. This was the direct cause of North European countries leaving NATO one after the other in the next few years. 
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73This utter failure led to Washington decreasing their expenditure on conventional forces and placing all their bets on Relic technology. With such investment, which could be considered to be somewhat irrational, American Relic weapon development also grew by leaps and bounds in a short period of time. Unlike how the Soviets developed Relic technology, most of the North American relics which were explored were the wreckage of various kinds of craft, and this wreckage was sent to the famous “Skunk Works”. There,  American engineers studied and reverse-engineered the wreckage, which gave them a lot of new design ideas for aerospace and aviation propulsion designs. 
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75In addition, the Americans were the first to directly use Collapse Fluid in warfare. In November 1967, after discovering Collapse Fluid in the D9-Beta-Zuma Relics, ARPA immediately began trials on the Collapse Fluid which would last for 9 months, and after verifying the dangerous characteristics of Collapse Fluid, the Pentagon became enamored of it and instead urged the President to deploy Collapse Fluid in the Vietnam War. Desperate to regain face after the Cuban Moron Crisis, the President signed the order to bomb North Vietnam with Collapse Fluid with hardly any hesitation.
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77As the Vietnam War was in full swing, the Soviets put the bulk of their efforts into researching “Moron”. At this point, Soviet Relic technology was in a slow growth period. In the late 60s, the Moscow State University’s slow progress on “Moron” triggered the Kremlin’s ire. However, they eventually managed to turn in satisfactory results -- in 1971, the Tabasar-B Starfish managed to stabilize “Moron”, and at the same time they finally deduced the true identity of “Moron”. With the finalization of the revised model of the ternary control bus “Емеля-M” (Emelya-M), the combination of individual “Moron” units and Emelya control devices let to the strategic weapon “Шука” (Shuka/Pike) entering the Soviet order of battle. 
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79Compared to the Soviets’ direct use of Relics as weapons, the US made much more progress on secondary applications of Relic technology. In 1964, Skunk Works’ mapping of a piece of wreckage discovered a new type of thruster engine that far surpassed the J58. In 1965, its successor, J64, entered service. The successful test flight of the SR-71A -- which used these engines -- in 1967 meant that the Americans had gained the ability to perform high-altitude aerial surveillance on the Soviets. But their ambitions did not end there -- why not design a high-speed, high altitude bomber in the same vein as well? And so, the High-Altitude High-Speed Strategic Bomber Project was established.
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81In addition to aviation, the Americans’ development of Relic weapons also bore fruit for their Navy. After analyzing the ship propulsion wreckage from Relic D-51 in 1969, the Americans successfully broke through the technical bottleneck for magnetohydrodynamic propulsion. This technology could be used on destroyers and nuclear submarines, and by reducing propulsion system noise, it gave destroyers a wider sonar detection radius, leading to American nuclear subs stalking beneath the waves like silent ghosts. 
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83The pace of American relic weapon development steady caught up to the Soviets. Part of this was because Washington was investing far more into Relics than the Kremlin, and also because the efficiency of the Western group cooperation system far outstripped the KGB-led system. While the US had already caught up to the Soviet Union in terms of technological level and weapons variety, the Soviets still had an advantage in terms of weapons in service. In 1972, as pressure built within the US regarding the Vietnam War, and the rift grew between CHina and Vietnam, the US tossed the ball to China, and in May of the same year, they brought up the possibility of a mutual withdrawal from Vietnam. <<The Sino-US Joint Communique>> was announced in Shanghai, the Advanced Research Projects Agency (ARPA) became the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), and Nixon visited the Soviet Union, still with hopes in his heart about the Vietnam War. The Kremlin took in all this, and deploying “Moron” once more was the only possible outcome.
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8532 Pike units were placed on public review during the 1972 October Revolution Parade. The proud exhibition of so many “Pikes” shocked the US far more than their initial presentation 10 years ago. According to ARPA’s reports, the Soviets should have been unable to fully control and turn “Moron” into a fighting force. However, all conjectures, conclusions and assessments were popped like soap bubbles as the “Pikes” were publicly unveiled. After that peade, President Nixon decided to abandon the Vietnam government. In 1973, with the signing of the <<Vietnam Peace Treaty>> and the American military’s withdrawal from the country, the United States decided that its future national defense objective would be to gain the advantage over the Soviets in terms of Relic weapons.
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87=======================================
88
89File Name <<Damage Assessment of Relic Gas Bombing>>
90Type: Military Assessment Report
91Classification: Top Secret 
92Source: Defense Intelligence Agency
93Remarks: July 8th, 1969
94
95On the 5th of July, the Thunderbolts Squadron based on the USS Enterprise completed their first Relic gas bombing of Vietnam. 12 hours later, tactical reconnaissance craft took off from the aircraft carrier performed a rapid survey of the same region. This report only analyzes aerial reconnaissance footage and images; an in-depth damage assessment will require a hands-on investigation.
96
97[DATA REDACTED]
98
99First, we have this high-altitude photograph. From this image, we can see that the 500-meter expanse of scorched earth in the forest is the direct result of our bombing. This effect comes from detonating high explosives behind a canister of “Relic gas” at an altitude of 300 meters, and by comparing it to photographs taken a month ago, we can see that the “Relic gas” bombing destroyed an area of at least 3000 hectares in size.
100
101[DATA REDACTED]
102
103Now, we have a 30-second clip of low-altitude aerial surveillance footage. Note the light spots on the film. These are not spots caused by exposures from light leaking through the shutter; our optical imaging experts believe that these are traces of intense ionizing radiation left behind on the film. From that we can conclude that the bombing site was inundated with ionizing radiation so powerful that even a surveillance plane flying at 2000 meters above the ground was exposed to it.
104
105[DATA REDACTED]
106
107Immediately after that is the forest depicted within this image. These regular, circular patches of seared ground are the results of our “Relic gas bombing”. Pay attention to the wreckage that can be glimpsed on the ground -- these are the rear halves of vehicles; these AK-47 rifles on the bed of the trucks suggest that the soldiers did not even have time to dismount and conduct a defense. From another aerial photograph of the same position we can see that the wooden stock and grip of the AK-47s are gone. As the experiments demonstrated, “Relic gas” exhibits targeted corrosion of organic matter. During said process, “Relic gas” produces an incredible amount of heart. Only temperatures in excess of 1000 degrees would cause gun barrels to warp like this. In addition, there is another photograph that shows sparkling objects on the ground. This is glaze; as before, only temperatures in excess of 1000 degrees would cause the ores in the ground to take such a form.
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109Thus, we can draw a conclusion: the performance of “Relic gas” in live combat matches ARPA’s deductions, and its ability to  degrade organic matter and generate it renders it more potent than any known weapon. Currently, the Enterprise still has 200 cubic meters of this “Relic gas” aboard it. We strongly advise that the Pentagon replenish the stocks of “Relic gas” aboard the Enterprise; current reserves will only allow us to conduct 3 or 4 more similar bombings.
110
111=======================================
112
113Chapter 3: The Later Era of Relic Weapon Development (1974 - 1981)
114
1151974 was good news for the Americans. The mass production of the high-altitude, high-speed strategic bomber “Aurora” which had been successfully test-flown last year was going very well. They had chosen to take off from the Yukon, fly over the entire Soviet Union, and at 9am Moscow time on May 1st, they flew over Moscow airspace, as though to cleanse the disgrace of the past two years. In response to their “parting the Iron Curtain”, the Kremlin sent a message to the North Vietnamese regime, supporting their invasion of South Vietnam. At the same time, they performed further modification and development of “Moron”. Originally, both the US and the Soviets had been at each other's throats over the development of Relic weapons, but the unexpected outcome in Vietnam threw the direction of Relic weapon development into disarray. In January 1975, after North Vietnam invaded, the South Vietnamese army and regime scattered to the winds, swiftly capitulating to their foe. South Vietnam had originally possessed the strongest combat units and the best armaments in all of Southeast Asia, with an overwhelming advantage over North Vietnam in terms of weapons and manpower. However, the lack of morale and the failure of command led to each unit fighting on their own, which resulted in them being isolated and swiftly defeated by the North Vietnamese.
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117The speedy defeat of South Vietnam made the US and the Soviets realise that even with powerful Relic weapons, a failure of command or morale would result in a unit being passively mauled to death. After 1975, the US and Soviets focused their efforts on developing information and command networks.
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119The Americans began investing in the ARPA-built ARPANET. The ARPANET was a distributed network system with no core server, did not require central control, and all communications data and message packets were routed through network nodes. The advantage of this framework was that transmissions could still go through even if various terminals and nodes on the network were taken out, as long as there were remaining nodes and terminals still in operation. After 1975, ARPANET was handed over to the US Department of Defense Communications Administration. Until the <<Relic Arms Limitation Treaty>> was signed by the US and the USSR in 1981, DARPA worked hard to build an autonomous control system for the Auroras, based on the ARPANET.
120
121The Soviets adopted a completely different approach. The Kremlin had invested in the All-State Automated System (OGAS), headed by Viktor Glushkov. After the Vietnam War ended in 1975, they accelerated the construction of this network. The tree-like structure of the OGAS system allowed any higher-level mainframe to grasp the status of any lower-level mainframes, while also allowing superior mainframes to authorize direct communications between subordinate mainframes. The existence of the authorization system solved the leaky bucket problem in the central network control node, but authorization still relied on the superior mainframes. If these mainframe nodes were destroyed, they would not be able to change the permissions of subordinate networks, and in certain situations this would lower the efficiency of command transmissions. Even so, after 1975, the National State University’s primary aim was to design a “Pike” command system based on the OGAS network.
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123Although the US and Soviets shifted their focus to the command and control systems of Relic weapons in the late era of Relic weapon development, this did not mean development of Relic weapons themselves had ceased completely. In 1978, the Americans successfully test-sailed a new model of nuclear submarine equipped with magnetohydrodynamic propulsion systems, and they deployed three such submarines two years later. The Soviets successfully used “Pike” Afghanistan, which put a full stop to the wild age of the Relic weapon development era.
124
125=======================================
126
127File No. :████
128File Origin: KGB 16th Directorate Confidential Office
129
130This copy is for reading only -- duplication strictly forbidden -- destroy immediately after reading
131Effective duration -- 25 years
132Confidentiality renewal date -- 2050
133
134File Title: Deployment Record of “Pike” at the Khyber Pass
135File Date: January 7th, 1981, Signatory: Technical expert -- Borikin
136
137On December 5th, 1980, the General Staff of the Soviet Armed Forces finally authorized the Afghanistan Theatre HQ to attack a rebel training camp near the Khyber Pass, to be conducted by the 794th Guards Engineering Corps in order to assess the combat effectiveness of “Pike”. The following document is a simple narration of the “Pike” operation. A damage effectiveness assessment will require close-range reconnaissance for reference.
138
139Before Christmas, an Mi-6 helicopter transported 4 units of “Pike” from the Tajikistan railway hub to the KGB base on the outskirts of Kabul. After a short vacation, the 794th Guards Engineering Corps responsible for the “Pikes” emplaned on 2nd January and travelled by air to Jalalabad, where they performed final adjustments to the Pike units. The target was 70 km distant, in Landi Kotal on the other side of the border. The CIA had built a large training camp there, where around a thousand armed militants were receiving training. Transporting “Pikes” by air was not an easy task. The combination of the “Pikes” and the “cans” in which they were transported very nearly exceeded the external suspension weight limit of the Mi-6. Though nervous, the 794th Guards Engineers successfully transported “Pike” to the interim operation center outside Jalalabad without any errors or accidents.
140
141According to the operation plan, the operational unit would use radio control to give commands to the “Emelya” control bus, directing the “Pikes” to head straight for the Landi Kotal training center. They would activate them once they were within 2 km of their target and have them enter “devour” mode, whereupon they would “devour” all enemy units. On the night of January 4th, the 794th Guards Engineers completed their final checks of the “Pikes”, and released the final action safeties restraining them. At midnight on January 5th, the operation began on time. In order to hide the “Pike” tracks as best as possible, the operational chose to set out at night and observed light discipline. The spread of Stinger missiles throughout Afghanistan meant that most of the 794th Guards Engineers remained in the Jalalabad operation center to decontaminate the “Pike” units, while the other operational personnel followed the “Pikes” on their advance. At 7:14am on January 5th, the “Pikes” arrived at the Afghanistan-Pakistan border. The operation unit verified the location of Landi Kotal from an elevated vantage point, and then gave the “Emelya” control bus the order to advance.
142
143At 7:30, 4 “Pike” units rushed down the Afghan side of the mountains, crawling at a speed of 32 km per hour. They forded a river between the mountains and charged Landi Kotal, which was 6 km distant. 
144At 7:45, the Landi Kotal sentries detected the tracks of the “Pike” Units and sounded the alarm. By this time, the “Pike” Units had entered “devour” mode. 
145At 7:55, “Pike” units 1 and 2 attacked Landi Kotal from the road to the north.
146At 8:03, “Pike” units 3 and 4 attacked Landi Kotal from the mountains to the west.
147At 8:05, the “Pikes” were subjected to rocket and heavy machinegun fire. However, these weapons did not harm them in any way.
148At 8:10, “Pike” units 1 and 2 had broken through the northern defense line of Landi Kotal.
149At 8:11, “Pike” units 3 and 4 had broken through the northern defense line of Landi Kotal.
150At 8:15, enemy armed combatants began moving down the border road to regroup in the core region of Landi Kotal, intending to consolidate their forces to resist the “Pike” attack.
151At 8:22, “Pike” units 1 and 3 were subjected to suppressive fire from 105mm cannon, which did not harm them in any way.
152At 8:23, “Pike” units 3 and 4 were subjected to anti-tank rocket fire from multiple directions, which did not harm them in any way.
153At 8:24, the “Pike” units broke through the enemy militants’ defensive lines and advanced on the American military consultants’ camp in the heart of Landi Kotal.
154At 8:28, the “Pike” units were subjected to anti-tank rocket fire from multiple directions and bombardment from 60mm to 80mm, but the enemy attacks did not harm them in any way.
155At 8:30, the heart of Landi Kotal was overtaken by the “Pike” units and the enemy combatants began to flee.
156At 8:40, “Pike” units 1, 2, 3 and 4 returned to their starting point.
157At 8:51, “Pike” units 1, 2, 3 and 4 were successfully loaded into their “cans” and ferried back to Jalalabad by Mi-6. 
158At 9:25, the 794th Guards Engineers quickly began decontamination work after the “Pike” units had deplaned. They cleared the Collapse Fluid on the “Pike” units and checked for Collapse Fluid leakage.
159
160After recovering the “Pike” units, reconnaissance-type MiG-25s took off from Kandahar and performed several scouting runs, which returned valuable combat data. The house sliced in half on this picture proves that the “Pike” units broke down all matter in their path, reducing them to their elemental state. The scorch marks on this other picture prove that “Pike” units generate an 8-meter wide trail while they are in operation. The shiny objects in the trails are glaze, which proves that “Pike” units generate temperatures in excess of 1000 degrees while in operation. Only temperatures in excess of 1000 degrees would cause the ores in the ground to take such a form. This matches the results of the trials in Tabasar-B. 
161
162The conclusion we can draw from this is the “Pike” units are a dangerous weapon that utilize Collapse Fluid. They can convert Collapse Fluid into a force field that disintegrates solid matter, generating great heat in the process of doing so. At the same time, the Collapse Fluid which the “Pike” units exude during operation will create ELID Infected like the example cases in Tabasar-B.
163
164=========================
165
166Chapter 4: The End of the Relic Weapon Development Era (1981-1983)
167
168E.L.I.D. -- Euroky Low-Emission Infectious Disease. It is the most dangerous by-product of Relic weapons, and a vicious plague that very nearly put an end to the human race. Early in 1976, the Americans witnessed their first death to ELID during the “Lady Liberty” series of Relic technology experiments, but it was only when “Pike” was first brought to light in 1981 that the US and USSR reluctantly began discussing this lethal illness. It was plain to see that the use of Relic weapons would inevitably generate ELID, and neither the US nor the Soviets had any effective way to prevent or cure the disease. The American Collapse Fluid bombings in Vietnam had led to over 10’000 deaths by ELID, while the Soviet use of “Pike” in Afghanistan introduced ELID to Central Asia and the Middle East, with their deplorable hygiene standards.
169
170After the US and the USSR abandoned their suspicions about each other and engaged in several rounds of frank discussion, both sides discovered, to their horror, that the continued maintenance and use of Relic weapons would lead to the inevitable spread of ELID. After realising that the policy of “mutually assured destruction” would ultimately lead to “mutual destruction”, the US and the USSR quickly reached a consensus and revealed the state of their Relic weapons development and their stockpiles to each other. To prevent the situation from spiralling out of control, both sides ratified the <<Relic Arms Limitation Treaty>> and declared an end to all Relic research and military deployment of Relic weapons, with already-deployed weapons to be dismantled within a limited timeframe.
171
172Epilogue: End of One Era, Beginning of Another
173
174As ELID ran wild across the globe, the failures of the superpowers showed politicians that only unity could help tide them over this crisis. In order to deal with the large-scale spread of ELID across the globe and reduce the risk of a second arms race after both superpowers destroyed all their Relic weapons, Yuri Andropov and Ronald Reagan announced the <<Geneva Gazette>> in Geneva on July 1st, 1983, declaring an end to 35 years of Russo-US conflict.
175
176A time of peace and development had begun, and Relic weapons, along with the aftermath of war and revolution, were buried there. But we have no way of knowing if that is the end of them, or if, in the not-so-distant future, men of ambition and conspirators will once again re-open Pandora’s Box and spread Relic weapons across the earth.
177
178=========================
179
180File Number: ████
181File Origin: CPSU Central Committee
182
183Open Information
184
185File Title: <<Geneva Gazette>>
186File Date: July 1st, 1983
187
188“We hereby declare the end of an era, an era known as the Cold War, an era where two sides took part in total military, economic, and political conflict against each other. In the face of this global danger that rises beyond race and nations, both sides have chosen to set aside their prejudices and ideologies. We will, and we have to unit to ensure the continuation of the human race. It is with that spirit that both sides now sign this gazette.”
189
190Yuri Vladimirovich Andropov
191Ronald Wilson Reagan 
192
193
194=========================
195
196Relic Weapon Proliferation Assessment -- Conference Briefing
197Record Time: April 29th, 1992
198United Nations Relic Agency
199
200On 19th August 1991, the Soviet Union underwent a regime change. In December of that year, the Russian Federation was established, while Kazakhstan, Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan went independent in succession. These five Central Asian countries were important military hubs. Not only had they been host to vast quantities of conventional weapons and small numbers of tactical and strategic nuclear weapons, they had once housed “Pike” systems.
201
202If the situation really is as stated by the Soviet government in 1990’s <<Relic Weapon Deployment Status Report>>, then there ought to be at least four bases operating “Pikes” in the Central Asian region, as well as stockpiles of at least 5’000 cubic meters of Collapse Fluid. Right now, these Relic weapons are now in the hands of these five Central Asian countries with unstable regimes. While we believe that the governments of these newly-formed countries will continue to abide by the <<Relic Arms Limitation Treaty>>, I do not believe they are able to prevent the worst-case scenarios Terrorists might be looking for an opportunity to seize these Relic weapons. Corrupt elements within the nation might not be able to resist the temptation to sell them at a high price while covering it up. The consequences of Relic weapons making it onto the international arms black market hardly bear thinking.
203
204The risk of “Pike” units leaking is not high. On the one hand, such a distinctive Relic weapon is too showy and arms black markets do not enjoy goods whose origins can be instantly deduced at a glance. On the other hand, the control buses needed for the “Pike” control system were long since gathered, sealed and destroyed by the Soviets, and currently, only the Soviet government is in control of the technology needed to re-create “Emelya-M”. 
205
206Therefore, I suggest we focus our efforts on the management and control of Collapse Fluid.
207
208The existence of Collapse Fluid in itself is overly dangerous. Once such dangerous materials are detonated along with explosives, it will activate their special characteristics and create unimaginable damage.
209
210Therefore, we need Moscow to send out suitable personnel to help us with our work. The new Russian Federation’s government must bear the responsibility of policing the Relic weapons of the five independent Central Asian nations. We must gain their trust; only then can we deepen our co-operation with them.
211
212=========================
213
214File Number “Soviet-N2-K”
215Type: Political Figure Data
216Classification: [Confidential]
217Source [___]
218Internal Troops Captain
219Капита́н Цой, Анна викторовна (Captain Tsoi, Anna Viktorovna, 2032.8.22 -- )
220
221Of Russo-Korean origins, she was born in Tashkent, Uzbekistan. Her father was an ordinary railway engineer while her mother was a secondary school teacher. At 7, her father was chosen to work for the Soviet Ministry of Transport, and she moved to Moscow with her family, and her quiet and happy life looked like it would carry on forever.)
222
223At 2 am Moscow time on the 2nd of March, 2045, tensions in his department meant that Viktor Tsoi had to do overtime. Half an hour later, the sole Minuteman III MIRV warhead to make it through Moscow’s ABM network impacted near the railway hub where Viktor Tsoi was working (it could not fully initiate as designed). Svetlana Sin had driven out to pick up Viktor Tsoi and also went missing, and she was ruled to have perished by the Soviet Interior Ministry’s Statistical Committee for the Accounting of War Dead, Casualties and Missing Persons. As she was far from her homeland of Uzbekistan, with no parents by her side, and with Moscow in chaos after the nuclear detonation, the Ministry of Transport’s Residential Sector 3’s tenant representative had no choice but to hand her over to a company of the Internal Troops’ 36th Brigade, who were organizing the Ministry of Transport personnel for evacuation.
224
225After the Soviet government followed their plan and sped up the evacuation of large cities, Anna ended up being grouped into a refugee column made up of Ministry personnel and people from the nearby streets and schools. On the 29th of March of the same year, they were evacuated to Ordzhonikidze, the capital of the North Ossetia-Alania Republic (formerly known as Vladikavkaz). Along the way, Anna got to know the warriors of the Internal Troops’ 36th Brigade’s 9th Company, and soon she became familiar with them. However, it was only a month after arriving at Ordzhonikidze that she learned her parents had died. At the tender age of 13, Anna soon became a girl of few words, and when the 9th Company troops learned about this, they looked for ways to cheer her up. They tried taking her out to have fun, and even snuck her aboard their armored vehicles. In the end, Anna was handed over to the family of Ismaili Ibrahimov, one of her father’s ex-colleagues and his good friend. She lived with his family of four (he had two boys of 15) in Beslan, only a few kilometers away from the 36th Brigade’s garrison. Though the outside world burned in the fires of war, Ordzhonikidze was as peaceful as ever, apart from the poorly stocked markets and the lack of food. Daily life proceeded in a calm and orderly fashion, and people continued going to the theatres and arthouses on Saturday afternoons to take part in cultural activities. Anna continued her studies during this time.
226
227One day in April 2047, the Soviet Union’s Minister of the Interior Zelinsky saw Anna on her way to school -- she was in the 7th grade at the time -- but she was travelling in a somewhat special way; she was on vehicle 291, one of the 9th Company’s Bumerang armored personnel carriers. Naturally, the 9th’s captain Zvetaev earned a tongue-lashing from the camp commandant, but the scene of Zelinsky shaking hands with Anna aboard the APC was captured by an attached photographer, and became a widely-circulated news photo after the war. Later on, Zelinsky and Anna ended up writing letters to each other, but the realities of the situation meant that their exchange of letters could not have lasted long.
228
229The war had been won, but to Anna -- who was about to graduate from her 11th year of school, the 1st of September 2050 became a watershed moment for her life. The armed Islamist extremists who had run wild during the Russian Federation era had their numbers greatly thinned after 2030, but the Outer Caucasus’ 40 years of independence and chaos had been fertile soil for their activities. As the war drew to a close, the FSB eliminated all of the core members of the Outer Caucasus’ nationalists and religious extremists, but the “Relocation Action Group” -- a core group of 20-odd individuals, led by Mashadov -- had evaded capture thus far. Of course, the net was constantly tightening around them. In order to avenge themselves on the Soviet Union, who had rallied the various countries of Western Europe in curtailing their activities, Mashadov placed all his eggs in one basket and mustered all the strength he could gather. On the 1st of September, an hour before the FSB’s Alpha Group and the Interior Troops’ 36th Brigade could close the net on them, Mashadov and his men set out from two different hideouts near Beslan and converged on the No. 1 Secondary School of Beslan.
230
231Apart from the police, Alpha Group, Vityaz and the 36th Brigade’s 9th Company showed up on the scene simultaneously. However, the terrorists -- who held over a thousand teachers, students and parents hostage, brandished an explosive device which had been modified from a Relic power source and demanded the Soviet government stop their counterterror operations with the countries of Western Europe and release all suspects taken, or else they would detonate the power source. However, one of the hostage-takers’ female members refused to shoot the hostages after she realized that most of them were children. After an 11-hour standoff, there appeared to be an internal dispute among the terrorists. The commanding officer decided to order an immediate assault to stop the terrorists from detonating the power source at any cost. During the assault, the terrorists’ Relic power source began to melt and jammed communications, which left everyone -- the special forces, the Interior Troops, the police, the terrorists, as well as the hostages and the armed populace -- deaf and dumb.
232
233Trapped inside the gymnasium amidst the chaotic crossfire, Anna found that the terrorists had dumped their “big bomb” in the center of the gym. Therefore, she took advantage of the fact that all the terrorists were returning fire from the window to charge towards it and ripped out all the wires. The countdown stopped, but the terrorists, who knew their time had come, began turning their guns on the students to open fire. The children fell, one after the other, but Anna was kneeling by the bomb, whose protective case blocked all the bullets aimed at her.
234
235The bloody battle ended soon enough, and all 20 terrorists had been slain to the last. However, there were already 186 students and even more parents lying in pools of blood. Anna’s class had lost over half her students, and Ismaili Ibrahimov, who had rushed over when he heard the news, had been injured in the crossfire. His eldest son Airmin had perished and his second son Ramzan had lost his left arm during the chaotic battle. Four men from the 36th Brigade’s 9th Company had died, and two of them were the vehicle commander and driver of vehicle 291, who had been responsible for knocking down the school gate. Two days later, Anna helped a heartbroken Ibrahimov and his wife bury Airmin, and then locked herself in her room for over 6 hours. When Ibrahimov bashed the door down in a panic, he found Anna had simply cut her hair off and written a letter to Zelinsky.
236
237One year later, after Anna graduated from the No. 2 Secondary School of Beslan, she entered the C.M. Kirov Command Academy, which the Ministry of the Interior ran in Ordzhonikidze. Soon, she transferred to Moscow to further her studies, and from then on, she only wrote about once every three months to the Ibrahimovs and friends of her parents. The last that the Ibrahimovs heard of her was in November 2059. She had bought some high-end daily essentials and rations that were hard to obtain in the outer states and sent them back to Beslan, as well as a short letter from her and a picture of herself in a military uniform, wearing a captain’s epaulettes.
238
239
240=========================
241
242File Number “Soviet-N2-Z”
243Type: Political Figure Data
244Classification: [Confidential]
245Source [___]
246
247Minister of the Interior and head of the Federal Security Service, member of the CPSU Central Committee and the Politburo.
248Зелински,Виктор Па́влович (Zelinsky, Viktor Pavlovich, (Victor Zieliński in Polish), of Polish/Byelorussian descent, 2000 -- )
249
250Born in Poznan, his mother was a Volkswagen sales manager while his father was a Volkswagen production line worker. Scrawny, tall (192cm), lives a Spartan life, very fond of children. Unmarried, might be homosexual. 
251
252Graduated from the University of Warsaw’s mathematics course. After graduation, he returned to the Poznan Volkswagen car plant to become an engineer, but just one year later both he and his mother were fired from the Volkswagen plant during a strike because he had organized a secret armed group, while his father froze to death during a suspicious drunken binge. After returning to his hometown of Brest, he took part in Russian Communist Party activities, later becoming the head of secret operations and internal security for the New Banner faction of the Russian Federation Communist Party. He was adept at concocting secret plans. After the revolution, he became the head of the Brest Security Operations Division, the Belarusian Safety Committee, the Chairman of the Belarusian Security Council and the Minister of Internal Affairs of Belarus. 
253
254During the revolution, this former Volkswagen engineer who was merely 30 years old had been working on the covert front of the party for six years, later becoming the Chairman of the Political Security and Intelligence Committees. His talent for intelligence work was astounding; the Russian Federation FSB agents assigned to watch him had no way of even getting a hold on him. Of course, the most shocking thing was that on a day in August 2031, their subject proudly walked into the FSB headquarters at Lubyanka No. 11 with a group of wanted criminals in tow and announced that he was taking over. Though it seemed like a farce, it had actually been planned beforehand; the FSB had always had a group of CPSU sympathizers inside them. In the face of public opinion, the defiance of the military and pressure from the inside, the FSB completed a tense, yet bloodless exchange of power, and as a result, the CPSU also made sizable concessions on their part, for instance; not investigating the FSB’s black budgets.
255
256After the FSB threw in with the CPSU, the country’s internal disputes made the situation as precarious as ever, and so the CPSU had no choice but to make a great concession to tradition: namely, by building a large interior ministry that would handle most of the nation’s security functions. Unsurprisingly, this motion met with opposition from the Ministry of the Interior, the FSB, SVR, and the Ministry of Defense. It was even blocked during a meeting of the Supreme Soviet. Even though the masses currently supported this political party calling itself the CPSU, in many peoples’ eyes, this CPSU was nothing more than a crude imitation of the old CPSU. Zelinsky did not become the head of the FSB immediately at the end of 2031. Instead, he simply headed an interim coordination commission in the less flamboyant position of Deputy Director -- as the Chairman of the Inter-Departmental State Security Service Cooperation Convention. However, in 2034, when the Supreme Soviet passed the <<National Safety, Enforcement and Intelligence Apparatus Reorganization Plan>>, the Ministry of Internal Affairs made a dramatic appearance, and discussion on the street suddenly surged. However, this “New NKVD” which looked very similar to the same Ministry of Internal Affairs from Beria’s time not only did not change its name, but the FSB, SVR and the Internal Affairs Enforcement Department were all allowed to do as they saw fit, without even the need to wear a uniform (and it has remained this way until today). It is said that Zelinsky used secret information from the various intelligence heads and his connections with Mikhail to control and purge a batch of intelligence and enforcement officials who refused to toe the line, and then used the FSB’s party connections to take firm control of the entire system.