Deus Ex Diaries Part Sixty-Six (Mankind Divided)

This is my ongoing exploration of the Deus Ex Universe, in release order. Whether you’re a newcomer or an old-goer, I hope to make this something you can read along with and enjoy. This time I continue Deus Ex: Mankind Divided.

Despite having convinced Rucker to come along peacefully, his own augmentations had seemingly killed him in front of me…

Before he had died, Rucker had given me a keycard to a side room. I told my pilot Chikane that Rucker was dead and I needed extraction as I checked out the room, though luckily nobody had been alerted yet. Grabbing the pocket secretary which held the evidence, I saw mention of an orchid delivery by an ARC cell, but it was clearly light on details for a reason. There was also a safe, so I hacked into that (burning through several Stop! programs in the process), to find a triangle code, a Praxis Kit, and some Neuropozyne.

I looted the office and checked Rucker’s computer, finding a threatening email from “Black Winged Angel” which said that he should listen to Viktor Marchenko and rethink his nonviolence stance. There were also two well-wishers, and one from “Sashka N.” about how Rucker didn’t want violence and seemingly didn’t want peace either.

On my mini-map I spotted some hostiles outside the room. I also happened to find a punchable grate, so knocked that through to allow me to exit the office. I snuck my way down a nearby staircase and hacked a door, finding myself in a storage room. There was some ammo and supplies, and behind a crate was another vent. I managed to sneak behind a lone sentry and hack open a nearby door, entering a large storage area with equipment for tending the gardens. There were three sets of windows, so I remained crouched as I looked around.

A security computer caught my eye and I hacked into it to disable the cameras and drones, of which I’d spotted two. Unfortunately, I hadn’t augmented myself enough to do that second part, so I went into my upgrades to have a look. Since I had 10 Praxis points, I of course chose Robot Domination so that I could disable the drones as I just mentioned. I also grabbed Ultra-Capacity Biocells and Efficient Recharge Rate so that I could run my cloak for longer if required. I then decided to disable the drones rather than make them kill the ARC soldiers. I hadn’t (knowingly) killed one yet, and I wasn’t about to start.

Sneaking out through the side windows, I made my way down a ramp while keeping an eye on my mini-map. There were people below me, so I threw a crate over the edge to distract them, and jumped down when they moved. Well, that was the plan, but only one of them moved and I had to jump down anyway, expecting to use my Icarus Landing System to knock out the others. Sadly, it didn’t activate, and I had to knock out one and shoot the other.

Running towards the objective marker, I dropped off of the platform I was on and was almost spotted by another ARC member, but managed to hit the button on the large doors without further incident. The door opened very slowly, but I was clearly in no danger, so I waited and strolled through once I was able. The route to the extraction point was absolutely clear, so I went down.

The cutscene kicked in with Jensen running like hell towards the aircraft as bullets whizzed past from behind, a squad of ARC soldiers trying to stop me from escaping. Jumping to safety, Viktor Marhenko made the soldiers stop firing, and I spotted Tibor Sokolwas also holding a gun. Marhenko and Jensen looked at each other before the doors slowly closed and the aircraft flew off, heading back to Prague’s Dávný District.

Jim Miller was there when we landed, and immediately laid into me about Rucker’s death. I decided to disclose that Rucker suspected someone inside ARC was working against him, and that person was likely the one who murdered him. I handed over the evidence that Rucker had gathered, the pocket secretary about the orchid, saying that it read like activation orders, and that it was likely Marchenko behind it. Miller told me that they had no hits on Marchenko when they ran the name through their databases, so I suggested getting Chang back at TF29 to check out the email and see what he could find.

Miller asked Chikane to fly him somewhere and the two of them left. I had the email, as well as the data disc that I’d given Daniel Fletcher, so was heading back to TF29. As I went, however, I contacted Alex Vega and briefly explained things. Apparently, Miller had gone to meet with the State Police, though I must have missed that, so I suggested that I break into his apartment. Meanwhile, Vega was to see what she could find on Marchenko, as well as keep looking into the VersaLife break-in.

The moment I hung up, David Sarif called me. Apparently, Vadim Orlov — the one who had designed my hidden augmentations — had been visiting Prague regularly since I had arrived. As luck would have it, he lived on the same street that Miller did! So I headed right over, hopping over a gate into the courtyard. There were two storage unit, so I broke into the left one first because as luck would have it I’d previously seen the passcode: 6354.

Inside were blueprints, maps, bottles of alcohol, a couple of weapons, and a pocket secretary. It suggested that this locker belonged to gun runners. Oh, I also found a laser sight weapon mod which I attached to my 10mm pistol.

Once I’d hacked into the second locker, I found that it was far more interesting. The first thing that stood out was an unsecure stone which I removed and found that it was hiding a pocket secretary. Apparently “the files” on “the Subject” were in a safe, with the code 3608. The second thing that caught my attention was a photograph on a cork board of me. Technically it was of me with Vega, and there was a photo of the LIMB clinic too, as well as some other places. Nothing in the locker made it obvious which one of us was this Subject, but I figured that it was tied to this scientist.

Using the storage unit door as a platform, I climbed up to the roof and walked along a ledge to the apartment balcony. Upon opening the doors, I found Orlov dead, his blood spilt on some blueprints for the Nanoblade — one of my hidden augmentations. I called Sarif to tell him the situation, as well as the fact I’d met him before, only it was in Alaska and he was going by the name McFadden. I asked him to dig into Facility 451, the W.H.O. coma ward where I’d woken up in after the Panchea explosion, and started looking for clues.

The corpse had a Tai Yong Medical vault keycard on him, so I figured another visit to the Palisade bank was going to be in order. There was a safe in the wall, which I’d already obtained the code for, so I unlocked it and grabbed some software and 123 credits. However, there was also Adam Jensen’s confidential medical history! At least one of the sheets was watermarked with the Taskforce 29 logo, presumably the files that the hidden pocket secretary had mentioned.

Hacking into the doctor’s computer, I found emails showing that he was in town to check on “our assets”, according to an encrypted sender named BDC. The second email appeared to be from a friendly colleague, but the third email was from Dr. Nicholas Cipra with the subject “Our Old Friend, D.”. Cipra had been sent to Prague to track down a woman referred to as 698843, someone that they had both apparently experimented on.

There was a second computer in the room, this one belonging to Madame Photographe. BDC had also been emailing them, confirming receipt of some surveillance on “the main subject”, who “the Watcher” was going to keep an eye on while she trailed “the girl”. The second email appeared to be from Orlov as the sender was OccasionalVisitor and they were returning to Prague, and they were asking for some records to be left in the storage unit. The third email was encrypted and unsigned, and told Madame to either extract Visitor or “retire” them as the operation was compromised.

I could only assume that Jensen was the subject, Vega the girl, and the Watcher was someone inside TF29. It was pretty clear that Madame Photographe had eliminated Orlov under orders, whatever the case, and judging from the storage locker, she knew how to remain hidden. I had to hope that I could at least find out who she was spying on me for…