JohnnyZ
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[Demons of NC] Chapter 21
🕑 Added 2024-11-05 05:00:00 +0000 UTCWell then... No more worries about the Maelstrom. If Smasher’s around, there’s only one thing to worry about: being around Adam Smasher. Here’s hoping he remembers we’re technically allies here and doesn’t, you know, carelessly murder us.
The borg straightened up. His landing had cracked the concrete floor, steel rebar sticking out like broken bones. A severed cable sparked on the ground.
"Commencing clearance," his metallic voice rang out, easily cutting through the gunfire.
To give Maelstrom credit, none of them ran. Hell, no one even seemed to piss themselves, though I wouldn’t go around checking.
Smasher took out the remaining psychos in about two or three seconds. Bits of Maelstrom bodies rained down from balconies and stairwells. And thankfully, none of the incoming projectiles were aimed at me. So far, so good. I just hoped Smasher would rampage for a while and then go clear the rest of the building while I quietly waited behind some crates or rejoined the squad.
But… wait. He’s heading my way?
The black figure of the borg definitely seemed to be moving toward me. At first, I froze. Maybe he’d just walk by? He wasn’t trying to kill me, and we didn’t exactly have much to discuss.
"Hey, how’s it going? I hear they patched you up nice in the last update"—yeah, no.
But he wasn’t just passing by. The borg approached without sidestepping. With one swipe, he shoved the rusty container out of his path, leaving a dent in the metal.
"Stop hiding. Mark the targets," his mechanical voice ordered, not sounding pleased.
Oh, right. I was supposed to be the runner handling surveillance.
"Understood," I replied.
I jumped into the next hall’s cameras, where eight combat-ready cyber-cultists awaited. They held weapons that wouldn’t do much more than scratch their biggest threat. I marked each one and sent the intel to Smasher.
I expected him to charge, blast through the wall, and tear everything apart. Instead, he moved more tactically.
A red laser flashed, creating a hole in the wall about the size of an umbrella. In seconds, six homing missiles followed, covering the Maelstrom soldiers. A swarm of smart rounds came next, finishing the job. I hadn’t even known this was possible—coordinating fire through an external camera and runner markings. About a hundred bullets formed an intricate trajectory, like a steel storm shredding the cultists into mincemeat. They didn’t even see what hit them.
With that room cleared, Smasher moved on. My job was to locate and mark the remaining enemies, at least those I could see through the cameras. I stayed in the hall under the broken roof, with Lucas covering me. David, on the other hand, seemed ready to follow Smasher.
"No," I radioed. "He doesn’t need help. Just stay back."
Thank the gods of cyberspace, David listened, staying out of the borg’s way.
Through the cameras, I watched Smasher unleash a high-tech festival of violence. He showed Maelstrom the difference between military-grade chrome and their cheap junk, proving there was still too much meat left in those cyber-psychos. When struck right, human guts could still fly out of those chrome shells alongside wires and processors.
The factory’s population was dropping fast, while certain walls had new passages. Some columns were now... gone.
"Mr. V?"
David snapped me out of watching the cybercultists get mowed down.
“What’s up?”
“Hostages. Can we locate them?”
Right. There’d been mention of that in the briefing too. I scanned the cameras again. My work as a spotter was pretty much done, but no hostages showed up. Maelstrom might have already scrapped them for parts, or maybe sacrificed them to Cyber-Satan.
There were a few rooms without cameras, though. Might be worth checking there.
“Let’s go. Got a couple places to check, and stay clear of the main action.”
We moved through the factory corridors again. Now, they were empty, except for body parts here and there. Smoke drifted out of some rooms, and the occasional distant explosion echoed. Smasher was finishing off any survivors.
We searched two small storage rooms first, packed with junk. In one, we found a fresh recruit—no red visor yet, but there were crude stitches on his face showing he’d had some initial implants. He was passed out on a filthy mattress, surrounded by empty drug packs. Must’ve had a rough time adjusting.
David ignored him, but Lucas didn’t hesitate to shoot the cultist newbie twice in the head.
Then we checked the basement. Most of it was flooded with murky, likely toxic water, but my helmet filter was enough to block any stench. A few rooms were dry, though. One was locked, but we broke in to find three hostages and two Maelstrom members.
“Stay back, or I’ll blow her brains out!” a red-eyed man with a rash-covered face shouted, pressing his gun to the head of a terrified girl—about fifteen, maybe.
“Damn corps! What do you want?” rasped another worn-down woman with skeletal metal arms, one holding a shotgun aimed at a tied-up man, the other gripping a bundle of crudely-made grenades. Too much explosive per square foot in here. Two fuel tanks lay nearby, one with a third hostage—a young Black woman with dreadlocks—wired to it.
The hostages were terrified but alive, more or less. The girl was looking at David with pure desperation, her lips silently forming pleas or prayers.
“Drop your weapons and surrender,” David said firmly, pointing a revolver at the psychos, his other hand lowering his shotgun to the floor. He was probably planning to use Sandevistan, didn’t want the shotgun swinging around mid-dash.
Lucas stepped in front of me like a shield, and I didn’t mind. The blast radius wouldn’t reach me, but shrapnel might.
“Put down your weapons if you want to live!” David shouted louder.
“Oh yeah? Why don’t you just suck it?” the woman cackled. “I don’t surrender to corps. Call the cops! I want a lawyer and a damn phone call. Gonna order myself a pizza.”
Somehow, I doubt the cops or the pizza will make it in time. Heavy steps echoed behind us on the stairs. I already knew who it was. Servo sounds made it clear the monster was close.
“Surrender…” David started to say again.
The wall behind us groaned and cracked. Smasher didn’t fit through the narrow doorframe—so he made it wider.
David fired up Sandevistan, clearly about to dash in and finish off the psychos to save the hostages, but he wasn’t fast enough. You can be quicker than bullets, but not light. A laser beam sliced the Maelstrom man in half, and the grenades on his body detonated, setting off the fuel tanks as well. The explosion tore the enemies and hostages alike to shreds.
David froze. The shrapnel hadn’t hurt him, but the sight had. Half of the young girl landed right in front of him, spraying corporate armor with blood and chunks of flesh. His visor was covered with bits. He tore off his helmet, then the balaclava, eyes wide, gasping for air.
Martinez was in shock, to put it mildly.
“Clearance complete,” said a metallic voice from behind us.
There was a barely noticeable satisfaction in it, or maybe that was just wishful thinking.
Smasher’s heavy steps receded. David clenched his fists, hurled his revolver to the ground, and, still gasping, choked out, “We… we could have saved them. We could’ve… could’ve! We could!”
Yeah, this wasn’t like taking down armed psychos. Martinez wasn’t ready for this. I wanted to say something over the comm, but events unfolded too fast. A blast of air hit me as something huge sped past—Smasher.
When I looked back, he’d pinned David to the wall, pressing hard enough that escape was impossible, but David didn’t even try.
“What’s with the pathetic whining?” Smasher’s metallic voice rasped. “They said you’d be useful, but so far…” The grip tightened, forcing air from David’s lungs like a steel press. “So far, all I see is a sack of meat and garbage. You’ve got plenty to cut out. Let’s start with that weak-ass pity. Burn this into your mind…”
There was a sickening crack, and blood dripped from David’s mouth. “Pity… is disgusting!”
One more crunch, then Smasher let him go and calmly exited the room without a word. I rushed to David, med-kit in hand. Surprisingly, he was mostly intact. David got to his feet, breathing hoarsely, wiping away the blood. Maybe the trauma had distracted him from the hostages’ deaths.
“Let’s get out of here,” I said, taking him by the arm and guiding him away from that damned basement.
So… David Martinez got a smackdown from Smasher—a little earlier than expected, and in a “preventative” dose.
Lucas followed us, picking up David’s helmet and revolver along the way. No point in ditching company property. Meanwhile, our specialists were already swarming the building, packing up every scrap of evidence. They were thorough. A thought crossed my mind.
What had the mission briefing said again?
“A gang has somehow gained access to cutting-edge technology through theft or a deliberate leak from an unknown corporation.”
But what if the corporation in question wasn’t so “unknown” after all? And what if it started with an “A”?
The Maelstrom gang had hit up several businesses in the city. They reached out to us for protection—probably even signed on for long-term contracts.
Arasaka immediately sends in its best mercenary, putting on a show of force against the gang. Beautiful, swift, and bloody. It’s practically ad-ready.
A typical thug would just show up and threaten to break bones if he didn’t get what he wanted. A more cunning manipulator, though, creates a problem for the victim, only to show up as a savior, solving it and looking like a hero. That’s what I did with Lucy. And it’s probably what Arasaka did to the companies the Maelstrom were unleashed on.
Just a theory, of course, but everything seems to line up. The only thing I can’t quite get is—why the hell was I brought into this? I found out soon enough.
On the ride back, silence hung in the air. It was broken only once by our team commander:
“Martinez, make sure you check in with the medtech back at base.”
David was in a dark mood, still breathing with a wheeze. Today, he’d seen corporate operations without any polish. All those terms about teamwork, following orders, and quick enemy disposal had transformed into actual bodies splattered on the walls. Smasher’s lesson was nothing like the Academy’s lectures.
Maybe I should give him a call later tonight. After today, who knows if he might do something reckless?
Back at the base, they sent me straight to Sadao Araki’s office. The Japanese man motioned for me to sit while he muttered to himself:
“Alright… Outer perimeter… Defense… Runner neutralized… Next…”
He was probably watching a quick-replay of the day’s op. Eventually, he nodded and turned to me. With his metal hand, he passed me a tablet showing some document. I skimmed the first few lines and felt a jolt of surprise. A transfer request. I flipped to the next documents—a contract extension and a stack of medical forms. Pension, life insurance, corporate perks with partner companies.
“Why me?”
“Two assassination attempts, the factory sweep—you’ve seen the reports. Once could be luck. Three times? No. You lack weapon training, but you’ve got quick-hack skills, tactical sense, and the right mindset. Those are the basics for a runner. The rest can be improved.”
“Alright. But you realize I’m already working counter-intel. That’s…”
“Counter-intel exists to weed out traitors and thieves,” Araki cut in. “Good blades don’t get wasted on pests. A real blade belongs in the field. Sign here. Refresher training, implant upgrades, and you can start with Security.”
Just like that? One signature and I’m out of Abernathy’s reach, though Security has completely different terms. This contract isn’t something I could break. It’s like an oath. If I sign, I’m locked in for a minimum of three years.
Chrome? Sure, that’s a problem, but one I can handle. If I avoid using certain abilities for a while, it’ll give my nervous system a break. Then I can start upgrading gradually.
“I’m not promising a higher paycheck,” Araki added. “But know this—while the risks here can be deadly, it’ll be an enemy who kills you, not someone stabbing you in the back.”
Right. The hint was obvious. Most people knew that counter-intel was its own brutal game. Way harsher than other divisions.
“Can I get some time to decide?”
Araki nodded and dismissed me for the day. For some reason, he handed me a standard Arasaka Security pamphlet. Like I’m some rando off the street who doesn’t know the ins and outs of each department. Fine, maybe it’s just so I don’t forget. I’ll look at it later and remember our conversation.
I walked out, turning the pamphlet over in my hands, reading its short text.
“Security is Arasaka’s core mission. We’re seeking strong, ambitious individuals prepared to face large-scale threats. If you’re punctual, a team player, and looking to hone your skills for the fight against terrorism, join our ranks.
Don’t hesitate. Become part of our team today.”
What a weird day. But now I can see the point of dragging me out for that raid.
From the start, it was planned for Smasher to handle the main sweep. They knew exactly what kind of threat the Maelstrom gang posed. David and I were sent on this “mission” as a test.
They were assessing his combat and moral fiber. For me, it was about my runner skills and tactical thinking. That’s why they let me propose plans and manage the fight in the initial stages. They wanted to gauge the limits of two potential recruits before sending in Smasher to clean up.
Why the special attention?
Well, David’s a genetic anomaly, practically made for implants. And me? Apparently, someone up top at Security got interested in an office grunt who survived two assassination attempts and turned a near-hopeless factory op into a win.
So, they set up a live-fire test.
“Home, Mr. Price?” Lucas asked, already out of his uniform and in a white blazer.
“Yeah.”
It was only six-thirty. Odd. I hadn’t left work this early in a long time. Security had paperwork too, but nothing like the slog of counter-intel.
Alright. I’ll get home, and there I can think things through in peace.
