Sean looked at the morning papers.
Then at Eljara.
Then back at the papers.
“That’s it?”
“That appears to be it.”
“Attendance figures. Weather. Drunks arrested. Lost property.” He turned the page. “Somebody stole a bloody decorative chicken.”
“A crisis for the Republic.”
“Not one word about last night.”
“No.”
Yesterday, hundreds of thousands of people had gone to the Wiesn to do exactly what people go there to do.
Drink. Eat. Sing. Flirt. Take photographs. Lose friends. Find them again. Spend too much money.
And somewhere among them, Delta Green had been hunting a missing man carrying something that should not exist.
The object had first appeared in a private ethnographic collection.
The paperwork was genuine.
The collector was genuine.
The shipping company was genuine.
The object was not.
Or at least, not in any way that stayed consistent.
Three witnesses had described it differently.
That meant little by itself. Witnesses disagree.
Then investigators found photographs.
They disagreed too.
Not different angles.
Not bad exposures.
Different objects.
Sean had studied them.
“Photoshop?”
“Possible.”
“The original negatives?”
“Also inconsistent.”
“Less possible.”
“One is forty-three years older than Photoshop.”
“Very less possible.”
“That isn’t English.”
“It conveyed meaning.”
The object was contained.
Then the container was found empty.
And the missing man was seen at Oktoberfest.
“Why the Wiesn?” Sean asked.
“We don’t know.”
“Crowds? Alcohol? Noise? Some ritual connection?”
Eljara shook her head.
“We know he went there. We don’t know why.”
“But there actually was something Unnatural.”
“Yes.”
“So paranoia was right.”
“No.”
Sean frowned.
“Evidence was right.”
That distinction mattered.
Knowing the Unnatural exists does not mean every rumour becomes true.
A strange reflection is still probably a reflection.
Folklore can be folklore.
A frightened witness can be wrong.
An agent who treats every coincidence as proof will eventually manufacture the pattern they are looking for.
Delta Green cannot afford that.
But neither can it dismiss evidence merely because the evidence points somewhere impossible.
They found the missing man because six tourists from Newcastle took a photograph.
Five beers.
One enormous pretzel.
Six smiling faces.
And behind them, reflected in polished metal, the missing man carrying a canvas bag.
Something protruded from the bag in the reflection.
In the photograph itself, nothing did.
Sean stared at it.
“Instagram saved civilisation?”
“It located one man.”
“Let me have this.”
The agents moved.
Quietly.
No evacuation.
No announcement.
Security was told there was a dangerous suspect.
One service corridor was closed for a fictitious technical problem.
Police were redirected without being told why.
Thousands of people simply walked around the barriers and continued celebrating.
Somebody probably complained because reaching his beer now took fifty metres longer.
He would never know why.
That was the point.
The missing man was intercepted behind the tents.
One agent was injured.
The man died.
The object was recovered.
Again.
By morning, the Wiesn was preparing to open as usual.
Sean tapped the newspaper.
“So this is what success looks like?”
Eljara looked at the photograph of the Ferris wheel.
“Yes.”
“No monster.”
“No.”
“No secret operation.”
“No.”
“No injured agent.”
“No.”
“Just another day at Oktoberfest.”
“Yes.”
Sean folded the paper.
Then stopped.
“If nobody knows what happened, nobody can judge what Delta Green did either.”
Eljara said nothing.
“The secrecy that protects people from the Unnatural also protects Delta Green from the people.”
“Sometimes.”
“So how do we know they were the good guys?”
“We don’t.”
“That’s not reassuring.”
“It wasn’t intended to be.”
The existence of the Unnatural changes the argument.
It doesn’t end it.
Sometimes the threat really is impossible.
Sometimes secrecy really does prevent catastrophe.
Sometimes an agent really does stand between thousands of ordinary people and something they should never encounter.
But none of that automatically makes every decision taken in secret right.
Necessary is not the same as innocent.
Sean looked through the café window.
Munich was having an ordinary morning.
Deliveries.
Tourists.
Traffic.
Hangovers.
Nobody running.
Nobody screaming.
Nobody knowing.
“Still worth it?” he asked.
Eljara watched the street.
“We know the object was real.”
“Yes.”
“We know it was dangerous.”
“Yes.”
“We know intervention prevented wider exposure.”
“As far as we know.”
“As far as we know.”
“So yes?”
“Yes.”
Sean waited.
Eljara looked at him.
“But if we’re protecting their right not to know, somebody still has to ask what we’re doing with the power that gives us.”
Sean picked up the newspaper again.
Nothing about Delta Green.
Nothing about the object.
Nothing about the agent who had been hurt.
Just a photograph of people enjoying the Wiesn.
He smiled faintly.
“Bloody good front page.”
Eljara nodded.
“Yes.”
Because sometimes the closest thing Delta Green gets to a victory photograph is a picture in which nothing is wrong.
AND WHAT DO YOU THINK?
If Delta Green genuinely saved thousands of people from something Unnatural, secrecy may have been necessary.
But that same secrecy means nobody outside Delta Green can know what happened, judge the decisions that were made, or hold the people responsible to account.
If the threat really is real, how much unchecked power would you give the people protecting you from it — especially when proof that they succeeded is that you never knew you were in danger?
Different views are welcome. Disagreement is welcome.
Spam, trolling and disrespect are not.