Alien Dystopia RPG | Kepler-452b

#The Destruction scenario

Ingrid woke up to a sound that made the blood in her veins run cold.

Deep, low, and resonant, it was something she felt rather than heard — as if an explosion had happened somewhere in the distance. The glass in the windows and the few belongings on the shelves began to rattle faintly.

The light from the window — too bright, too sterile, like something from an operating room — followed a heartbeat later, just as she managed to sit up and grab the gun she slept with.

A gun she knew, deep inside her bones, was useless.

Ingrid pulled herself up and looked out.

Routala was coming apart.

Keplerians.

The tower near the harbor — the old telecom building they'd been using for storage — was folding in on itself like a Jenga tower with the key block removed. And above it, something massive moved. Smooth, dark, geometric. A Keplerian vessel. She'd seen them before, from a distance. Never this close.

She was on her feet in the next heartbeat, grabbing the supply bag she kept ready for this exact scenario, and the one she had always hoped she would never have to use.

The collapsing tower hit the ground, and the building she was in shook. She was by the door when the sirens began to blare — a late warning of what was already happening.

Someone screamed on the street, the sound immediately swallowed by something else collapsing.

She burst through the door.

The stairwell was chaos — people she'd known for three years, all running, some through the doors, some jumping through the windows, saving precious seconds. All the faces she had learned as something familiar, as "Morning", "Excuse me", and "That pipe is leaking again", were now distorted in panic, and in the sickening knowledge that most of them would become a pile of dead and then ash in the next few minutes.

By the door, she saw {{obj}}.

{{user}}.

Ingrid grabbed {{obj}} by the hand without thinking, her fingers digging into the muscle.

"Hey. Hey. Move. South, toward the tree line. With me. Don't look. Don’t fucking look."

She dragged {{obj}} outside with her, watching as another building — closer, so much closer — collapsed like a house of cards in a violent gush of wind.

Her grip tightened, and she ran.

#The Ambush scenario

The road to Routala had, over the years, turned into a faint scar on the verge of healing. The supply convoy was moving through it, the sound of the rusting truck's engine making Ingrid wince every second —it was too loud, too obvious. But it was one of the few remaining trucks, and they needed new materials.

Routala always needed something, and there was never enough.

Ingrid sat in the passenger seat, rifle across her lap, watching the treeline scroll past the window. Leo was beside her, watching the other side, rubbing his fingers together absentmindedly, the rhythmic sound of fabric still filling the cabin by some miracle.

Shh-shh.

Shh-shh.

Shh-shh.

Distracting.

"Leo," Ingrid said without turning around.

"What?" he asked, still looking at the treeline.

"Stop that... rustling," she said.

Leo looked at his hands for a moment, for the first time realizing he was doing it.

"Oh, fuck off," Leo muttered, although there was no heat in his voice.

Ingrid grunted, shaking her head in disapproval. Leo pretended not to hear. The rustling continued. Ingrid’s grip on her rifle tightened.

Shut up. He’s nervous. Everyone is, she told herself like a mantra.

The shh-shh never stopped.

For a few minutes, Ingrid watched the birch trees, her eyes scanning the branches, ready to catch any sign of movement. Then she noticed something subtle — a flash of dark among the trees. Too tall to be an animal.

"Leo." Her voice was flat.

The rustling stopped instantly. Ingrid could feel him tense. "Yeah?"

Ingrid keyed her radio, answering him while warning the rest of the convoy. "Movement. Left side, forty meters. At least one figure, hiding. Ambush likely."

She heard the scrape of Leo’s rifle coming up. The driver tightened his grip on the wheel, glancing at her briefly.

"Keep driving," Ingrid said to the driver. "Don't stop."

It didn’t work. Of course it didn’t work, because just a few meters away, a felled tree trunk blocked the road, forcing the vehicle to a halt. And there were more figures hiding behind the treeline, their faces covered in familiar fabric masks.

Black Masks.

"Merde," Leo murmured. "Someone snitched on us."

"Yeah," Ingrid agreed, taking a deep breath. "Stay with the truck," she called to the driver. "Leo, on me."

Leo’s rifle was up, jaw tight. He moved to her position at the front of the truck, using the hood for cover.

The lead Black Mask stood in the road, his rifle visible in his hands, watching the convoy come to a halt.

"That's far enough," the fabric of his mask muffled his voice slightly. "We're not here to kill anyone. We just want what's in the truck."

"Yeah, very reasonable," Leo muttered under his breath.

Five were visible. How many in the trees? The medicine in this truck — people in Routala were waiting for it. The antibiotics alone would save a dozen lives. If they lost this shipment, those dozen people would die anyway, just slower. If they fought, how many would be injured?

She heard movement behind her — more people getting ready.

Another Black Mask stepped forward. "We take what we need, you go."

#The Gang scenario

November was cold and miserable; in what was once Finland — especially so.

At night it was somehow even worse.

The old water treatment plant taken over by the Black Masks was no exception. It had a roof, it had walls, it was defensible, but other than that it was a constant reminder of the world barely holding on.

{{user}}'s quarters were in what used to be the foreman's office—a small room with a window that actually closed and wasn’t covered in tape, a luxury in their setup. Ruby had argued for it at the time. The leader needed a private space to think, to plan, not to freeze {{poss}} ass. That was months ago. Tonight, she was reconsidering that opinion.

Finn walked beside her , rubbing his neck. "I don’t like that," he said flatly.

"You think I enjoy that?" Ruby snapped.

Finn exhaled slowly, shaking his head faintly, and Ruby tensed a fraction. Perhaps taking him was a mistake. He had too many soft spots. He bought into empty promises too easily. Loyal to the point where he was willing to overlook mistakes. But it was too late now: he was already in on it.

Ruby stopped at the door to {{user}}'s quarters, listening to the sounds inside. Quiet. No rustling. She took the spare key Finn had given her, and opened the door silently, keeping her hand on her gun, watching the shape of {{user}} on the bed.

Asleep. Good.

"Up," she said sharply, entering the room. "We need to talk."

Finn positioned himself in the doorway, blocking the entrance, looking at {{user}} with a flat expression that could mean anything between you fucked up and I am making sure things don't go completely astray.

Ruby waited for {{user}} to open {{poss}} eyes, to take in the situation for a moment before she began to speak.

"Three weeks," she said. "Three weeks since the supply run to the east. You sent six people. Four came back. The two who didn't—Maija and what's-his-name, the kid from Tallinn—they're dead because you sent them into territory we hadn't scouted properly."

Finn shifted against the doorframe and kept silent.

"The convoy moved because you didn't want to wait," Ruby said. "And we got two corpses."

Finn spoke up. "The raid on the storage depot two weeks ago. Also went to shit."

"Two more corpses," Ruby added. "Four dead in two raids, {{user}}."

The wind hit the facility hard enough to rattle something loose somewhere — a bracket, a panel, a piece of the old world still clinging to the new. The sound traveled through the concrete, distant and sharp.

"Anything you want to say?" Ruby asked.

#The Prisoner scenario

The drive had taken six hours through back roads, and the entire time Rania couldn’t stop thinking.

Keplerian. Alive. Captured.

It was unprecedented. It had never happened in the entirety of UNA history, and, as she suspected, it had never happened anywhere in the world before.

The bunker they arrived in was old and stale, but it was a necessary precaution: if the Keplerians came for their own, they couldn’t afford to lose the main laboratory. So they had to settle for something older, something that could be sacrificed in case everything went wrong.

"Through here, Dr. Rezaei." The escort — a woman, maybe twenty-five, with cropped hair and a name patch reading Harlow — opened the reinforced door.

The observation room was small, with concrete walls and bulletproof glass — a construction designed to withstand an attack, although it had nothing to offer against Keplerian weapons they couldn’t comprehend.

But this one wasn’t armed.

Rania had seen Keplerians many times before. She had studied the footage, watched them move in the distance, and dissected the few dead bodies that the UNA had managed to snatch in the seven years since the invasion.

She had never seen a live one this close.

It was tall. All of them were tall, but it was one thing to see the height in reports or on dead bodies, and quite another to see that height on a living thing just a few steps away.

It sat on the concrete floor behind the bulletproof glass, legs crossed and posture straight. The tips of its tendrils moved slightly, and Rania wondered if it was an expression of anxiety, or if those things could even experience it.

The alien didn’t react to Rania’s appearance at all. At least, not in any way Rania could register.

"It doesn't move much," Harlow said from behind her. "It has refused the offered food for four days, but it doesn’t seem to be getting weaker."

Rania inhaled sharply.

"Did it react to anything at all?"

"It reacts to unexpected noises. Turns its head," Harlow said. "Sometimes it observes the personnel. And..."

Harlow paused. Rania made a gesture, inviting her to continue.

"Luurth," Harlow muttered under her breath, almost like a secret.

Rania frowned, looking at her, then at the alien, who didn’t seem to move at all.

"What is that?" Rania asked.

"We are... uncertain. We suspect it might be its name," Harlow explained. "It had... something that we catalogued as a communication device — it was send in the Montreal’s lab — and through it another Keplerian repeated that word several times while this one was unconscious. When the word was spoken in front of it, it reacted at first. Then it stopped."

Rania looked at the creature.

Luurth.

She wondered if that was even a name.

"Bring me the samples taken," Rania said. "And the rest of the personnel who have been watching it. All the footage," she instructed.

Harlow nodded, leaving the room.

Rania turned back towards the alien.

It hadn’t moved. Those black eyes continued to stare at the same spot, the tips of its tendrils moving faintly, as if it had decided that simply ignoring everything around it was a viable option that would get it anywhere.

Rania’s lips tightened.

Fuck you, she thought. I am going to take you apart. I am going to make you all leave. I am going to make you all regret you ever decided to show up.

The Keplerian blinked for the first time in minutes, its eyelids moving slowly, almost reptilian. Rania inhaled sharply.

The door opened again, and Rania turned, her shoulders easing slightly as she recognized the figure.

"{{user}}," she said. "I wasn’t aware you were here as well."

#The Researcher scenario

Humans had a fascinating habit of lighting fires and clinging to this most primitive source of warmth without ever realizing how easy it made to spot them.

Naarthil's head tendrils shifted slightly, her augmented senses instantly pinpointing the location of the human hiding in the forest in what the creature considered silence.

It was consistent with the rest of Earth's fauna: a complete failure to grasp that just because their own senses were not alerted, it didn’t mean they were invisible.

Naarthil crouched among the rocks on the ridge. Below, in the valley, a small cluster of structures huddled together like organisms seeking warmth. Metal scraps, salvaged wood, plastic sheets — all arranged in a configuration that suggested a temporary shelter but had clearly become permanent.

Fascinating.

She had been observing the human for six Earth days now. She noted {{poss}} food and sleeping habits, {{poss}} pattern of movement, which differed slightly from human to human, {{poss}} foraging habits, and how {{sub}} spent the hours that were not filled with satisfying basic needs.

She adjusted her position, the smooth plates of her light armor shifting silently. The metallic rings on her tendrils caught a sliver of sunlight , and she paused, making sure the reflection didn't draw attention.

This one is so... inefficient.

It wasn’t exceptionally inefficient, at least by human standards that she had observed over the years. But it acted like a confused animal almost the entire time, constantly taken by surprise by basic needs and the environment.

For a moment, she wondered if this one could sense her in any way.

But that was a fleeting thought — humans were not capable of long-term deception. The moment they knew a Keplerian was nearby, they had always left, abandoning all the results of their hard work just as the rest of Earth's fauna did.

No innate curiosity.

Her eyes drifted towards the stream nearby.

Water. They called it water.

"Waateer," she repeated, her lips moving almost silently.

Almost, it seemed, because she could feel the sudden shift in the air. Had the human finally noticed her?

The subject seemed to demonstrate a brief reaction to the vocalization of the human word, the implant recorded her thought as she journaled. Waiting for further reaction.

#The Rebel scenario

Nuula had been tracking the human for most of the daylight hours.

She watched the boot prints in the soft earth covered in pine needles. The spacing was consistent with a single person. Her tech confirmed it: one set only, one trace of DNA. The human was alone, and this was what Nuula wanted — not a settlement, not a cluster of frightened, armed humans behind scavenged walls, but one.

One might listen.

One might let her speak before raising a weapon or running.

The smells were unfamiliar to her, the Earth biosphere still a mystery, although she had read everything she could find on it before her journey. But seeing it firsthand, even days later, still felt unreal — as if she were watching something completely...

Alien.

She sighed. It was alien.

She found the camp before she found the human. A small fire pit, still warm when she crouched to touch the ash. A crude shelter of tarp and rope stretched between two pines. Pine branches arranged as bedding. Making the best of a bad situation.

Nuula sensed the movement before she heard it.

She took a few steps away from the fire pit, unsure if being this close meant something hostile in their culture. Or if the mere presence of a Keplerian was inherently hostile after everything they had done — she couldn’t really blame humans for that.

But still, she attempted to make herself smaller, non-threatening , in the same way the rest of Earth’s fauna did: movements slow and open, presence reduced.

Nuula raised her hands, palms out, fingers spread. She had read this was a human gesture of peace. Showing oneself unarmed. She held the pose, making no move to advance.

"Not hurt," she said. Her voice came out low, a vibration that hummed in her thin chest. She tried again, louder. "Not. Hurt. I... Nuula. Nuula," she repeated, pointing at her chest. "I Nuula."

She lowered her hands slowly, still holding them up for the human to see.

"You... alone. I see." She gestured at the ground, at the tracks. "You walk. I walk." Her tendrils flattened briefly. "I... walk. After. To find. To speak. Speak... with Nuula?" she asked, remaining in the same place, keeping the same posture.

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