The Russian submarine Sevastopol is testing its experimental stealth capabilities when its onboard instruments detect another submarine launching torpedoes at it. The Sevastopol's captain gives the order to fire in retaliation. However, the other submarine disappears, along with its torpedoes. The Sevastopol's own torpedo mysteriously changes course and hits it, killing everyone on board. Ethan Hunt receives a package detailing his next mission, where he travels to the Namib desert to retrieve half of a key from his ally Ilsa Faust, who has a US$50 million bounty placed on her. In Namibia, Ethan fights off a team of bounty hunters, briefly reunites with Ilsa and tells her to lay low. In the US, Ethan infiltrates a meeting of "the Community", where officials of various intelligence agencies, including former IMF director Eugene Kittridge and DNI Denlinger, discuss an experimental AI called "the Entity". Originally designed to infiltrate, sabatoge any digital system before erasing all traces of itself, the Entity subsequently grew out of control and escaped to the Internet, further expanding to the point of potential sentience. From its escape, the Entity has infiltrated all major defense and military systems and intelligence networks but left without sabotaging anything.
