Mansion Hideout

**Zero**

***It's... grains of sand in a shrinking hourglass...***

## Plot Summary

**(It should be noted that due to the bizarre effects of Chronos in the developments of Mansion, these are the events that happen before the mission officially begins.)**

Zero finds himself in sleep paralysis in his apartment.

As he is unable to move, he is towered over by the menacing figures of the Masked Men. When he is finally free from his restless sleep, he sits up and grabs his chest as he struggles to calm himself down.

The scene cuts abruptly from him laying down on his couch to the Psychiatrist's office. The Psychiatrist addresses Zero with the question the player had seen during the Factory mission. "So... tell me again about the Men in Masks..." Zero looks around in shock and discomfort, the player is given a choice to react with shock or to try and express some restraint. As Zero tries to talk to the Psychiatrist and explain the grim threats he's been facing, it seems as though the Psychiatrist isn't listening.

Suddenly the Psychiatrist transforms into V. V then approaches Zero and instructs him to "get up."

Zero is placed at the beginning of the level with no instruction. The player can take any action from hereon out, but eventually movements devolve into a blur of nonsensical noise.

As Zero breaks free from his previous hallucination, he has a period of clarity in which he walks through some form of cathedral, and the following monologue appears:

**Cathedral Monologue**

***Twenty-eight years in that godforsaken jungle.***
Killing soldiers wasn't so bad. I hardly remember it.

But burning those villages, watching those naked peasants cry...

I see it every day. It's not PTSD, it's the drug.

It's only been a week, but it feels like a year.

Every word is getting longer, the mosquitoes are getting louder.

When the drug runs out, time stops, and you're stuck in the jungle forever.

It's... grains of sand in a shrinking hour glass.

I know what comes next. I need to ask you a favor.

As the screen fades to white, the scene abruptly changes to New Mecca, supposedly 688 days in the future. Zero is shown begging in the street, similarly to the man he may or may not have murdered in New Mecca who insulted him and questioned his service in the war. The Masked Men stand near Zero and openly chide him for his withdrawal.

The screen distorts, and for just a moment, a harrowing version of the Psychiatrist's office can be seen: Zero kneeling in the center of the room, beside a violently dismembered Psychiatrist, and the Little Girl stuck to the wall behind them, impaled through the chest by Zero's own sword. Finally, Zero's hallucinations are put to an end as the Psychiatrist gives him a large dosage of Chronos to compensate for missing the previous day, while commenting on his "thousand yard stare."

Zero enters the mansion through a ceiling window. Following V, He fights through the guards inside . In the last room of the mansion he uses his precognition to kill the guards in the room. But in reality he triggers a bomb trap that knocks him unconscious. He wakes up in a dark room with V prompting him to wake up. V will repeatedly kill Zero. This sequence is only ended by the player annoying V until he kills Omar Al-Qasim out of rage and asks Mr. Kissyface to kill you. Zero escapes from the chair and kills Mr. Kissyface . Meanwhile outside, SNOW and V are discussing about their current situation. SNOW suggests that V will get a reward from “The Boss” for eliminating “The Swordsman”(presumably Zero). As Snow teleports away, V is startled by a dismembered body thrown out of the window of the building he was in before. He runs away while Zero chases him on his motorbike. After fighting his henchmen, V arrives in a helicopter, firing missiles at Zero. Zero deflects his bullets back at his helicopter, bringing it down. V, now visibly wounded and on the road, tells Zero he will kill “The Dragon”(who he assumes is Zero). Before Zero is able to kill V, The real Dragon (Fifteen) shows up and takes V away.

## Notes

It is currently unclear whether the cathedral monologue is given *by* Zero or *to* Zero. The opening line stating "twenty-eight years" seems to contradict his given age of 22 on his dossier, but the discrepancy could just as easily be explained by Zero's distorted perception of time.