Dynorion
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Mind & Machine C.22
🕑 Added 2024-06-01 17:07:46 +0000 UTCChapter — 22
Kiernan stood sweating in front of a desk that used to be his. With his repeated failures, the possibility of reversing his current situation seemed less and less likely.
Kiernan's right hand, a woman called Meira, who was nearly as cybernetically augmented as himself, suddenly opened the door into his office.
Meira was the only one except him in the whole of The Pistons gang who could sport so much chrome without being classified as a Vergewalker, her faculties wholly intact. That was one of the reasons she was his right hand in managing the gang's affairs.
Not that she seemed very pleased with the position at the moment.
Kiernan couldn't really fault her. He wasn't pleased with anything that had happened in the last three years, especially the entirety of the past year.
As she entered the room, her eyes darted toward the person sitting in what should be the chair exclusive to the boss of The Pistons before darting away. The long bangs of crimson hair pulsing like a cascading waterfall of blood hid most of her upper face, which was made of metal, but they didn't entirely hide her eyes.
Blue eyes full of fear.
Another failure? This can't be good, Kiernan thought with a chill running down his spine. They still haven't even told me why we must catch this woman, but it seems essential that we do.
"U, boss, it's, um," Meira began hesitantly, merely to be interrupted by the person sitting in the only armchair present in the room.
"Out with it, and don't sugarcoat. My dissatisfaction will only rise if you drag this out," an androgynous and wholly artificial voice said.
The sound didn't originate from the person sitting in the armchair but from the speakers present in the room itself.
Not that it made any difference, as their appearance was hidden to such a degree that even their gender became impossible to tell through the sleek, tactical, full-body armor they wore. It resembled the color and texture of opaque, milky quartz.
The only thing breaking the otherwise uniformly colored full-body armor was one glowing, golden horizontal, and one not as luminescent golden vertical line on the front of the helmet. The vertical golden line ran the length of the smooth faceplate, while the horizontal line was a tiny bit shorter and placed at eye height.
"Y-Yes, lord," Meira stammered. "The target was intercepted between Street#182 and #183 in an alleyway but managed to neutralize the three members who cornered her. Just a few minutes ago, she neutralized another pair that was sent to slow her down. The encirclement is proceeding as planned otherwise, and we estimate that we'll be able to completely surround her in approximately ten minutes."
"I did warn you that the encirclement of at least fifty of your gang was most likely necessary to stop her even with us tracking her location. We still don't know her full capabilities as I didn't spread my threads to every one of your members before today's operation. A mistake on my part that I've begun to rectify while impatiently waiting here." The artificial voice somehow made the acknowledgment of a mistake on their part sound like an accusation, and Keiran felt himself shudder on the inside.
"I-I'm confident that the target won't be able to escape thanks to the tracking data you're supplying, lord. Please await the good news," Meira said while she began to back away with her head lowered.
"Yes. This old relic and his AI were tough opponents, but the tracking data still being sent to him sure was convenient after she escaped," the person in the armchair said, one finger poking the eyeball with a crimson iris surrounded by a sclera as black as the void.
The eyeball being played with sat in the severed head on top of the desk, and two cables from each of the 'lord's' wrists went into its neural link's data ports.
Damn freaky Magi shit staining my desk. Regardless of how much I disliked him, I can't help but wish that WolfMosh sat in that chair instead of on the desk.
The smooth faceplate crossed by golden lines suddenly turned toward him as the thought flitted through his mind, and the vertical line began to blaze.
"I'd thought you'd learned by now not to harbor such meaningless hatred toward your betters," The androgynous voice spoke mockingly through the speakers.
Kiernan didn't hear any of it, though, as he was crying his artificial lungs out while writhing on the floor, the vertical golden line abruptly blazing a prelude to the start of another session of 'behavioral correction.'
Meira didn't dare make a sound as she closed the office door to silence the screams.
***
Running across a walkway above the street filled with cars, motorcycles, and trucks swiftly passing beneath, Rei pondered calling a cab or running toward the closest station for the tram hung from the rail she'd seen pass above half a minute earlier.
No. Can't risk being trapped. Anyone tracking me would surely notice me traveling at such speeds, and they could perhaps block the road, cause a traffic incident, or just corner me on the tram. In all instances, I'll have nowhere to escape.
She'd love to speed far away while resting her aching bones and burning muscles, but it was too great a risk. On foot, she could at least make some use of her environment.
I don't understand how I can be tracked, though. I've found no code that's been transmitting data without my permission in any of my cyberware.
Wait... my cyberware? I was awake when Franklin installed it all, but who's to say that what he put into me was actually what was on the data shard he inserted into my neural link for me to read.
Having found a new avenue to explore, Rei continued weaving through the crowds of people who were slow to move out of her way on the not-too-wide walkway. Some cursed at her as she did her best not to bump into them, but none had taken such offense yet that they became physical.
Her general appearance and two combat knives might have helped to discourage anyone with the thought.
How am I supposed to determine if the cyberware implanted is genuine? Nothing in their data suggests they're something entirely different or simply modified versions.
Suddenly, Rei had a brainwave and thought of the Samurai System and its mysterious habit of knowing things even she didn't know.
Perhaps...
She paused as she sprinted off the walkway and turned down a new alley, needing to dedicate both parts of her split mind to the task. She wasn't sure it would work, but it was worth a try.
Leaning on [Strong Will] and projecting as clear instructions as she could toward the System, she infused it with as much willpower as possible. There was immense resistance toward her imposed will, but it slowly started to wane as she reinforced the thought with greater and greater mental pressure. That there even seemed to be a chance of it working spurred her on.
Finally, something gave, and Rei staggered, a hand catching her against a metal fence as she panted. Blood was dripping from her nose, and she supposed she'd pushed herself to her limit in desperation. Luckily, it seemed to have worked, considering the subsequent notification.
「SYSTEM NOTICE:
System process manipulation detected.
Checking authority…
Host authority valid
Reconfiguring…
Reconfiguration complete」
The notification was less ornate than usual, more robust, and held as much gravitas in her mind as the last time it had presented itself. It was soon followed by another notification. It didn't hold the same mental weight but still felt robust in a likewise weird way.
「Samurai System:
New system process generated: Process#8uy4
[Process#8uy4]
Adds another tab to the status sheet displaying currently equipped cybernetic implants.」
Rei opened her status sheet.
「Takeda Rei:
Level: 3 [1050/ 4000 Experience]
Body: 6
Mind: 11
Ego: 8
Perks: [...]
Skills: [...]
Implants: [...]
Perk Points: [1 Mind]
Skill Points: 2」
Seeing the new [Implants] tab, she expanded it.
「Implants:
[Neural Link]
Model: Cogmeld Link V6
Maker: Novum Industries
Description: Fast and intuitive neural link bridging the gap between the mind and the digital. Next-gen deep-learning algorithms to streamline thought processes into action.
[Eyes]
Model: Luminous Mark IV
Maker: Ghanhina Augments Corp.
Description: High-definition vision with mesh scanning capabilities. Customizable sclera/iris color and luminosity.
[Ears]
Model: Kosher Aug. Rend. 1
Maker: Demorama Tech
Description: Crystal clear sound with increased control of volume. Automatic dampening on damage-inducing sounds, such as gunshots.
[Cyberdeck]
Model: Mesh Herald 2 (Modified)
Maker: Singularity Systems Inc.
Description: A top-of-the-line cyberdeck with excellent processing speed and RAM. Great stability during operation. Caution is advised if put under heavy load for a prolonged length of time without an external cooling system.
WARNING: Tracker installed.
[Core]
Model: Soulflame Core Mark IX
Maker: Solaris Corp.
Description: Miniature fusion reactor powering any and all cyberware. Remains operational for an average of ten to fifteen years (earth standard) according to load.
[Data jack]
Model: Bitflow 1
Maker: Singularity Systems Inc.
Description: Simple yet efficient data jack. Significant bandwidth and easy to extend or retract before or after use.」
It mainly contained the same information as the data shard, with a lot less marketing lingo in the cyberware's descriptions. Some of it still seemed abstract, such as 'Next-gen' or 'Top-of-the-line,' as she wasn't sure if the System even knew what to measure against. It may have simply copied that part from whatever description was provided.
It all mostly checked out, though, except for one thing:
Mesh Herald 2 (Modified), huh? So, a tracker operating outside the cyberdeck's internal processes is actually installed, meaning it cannot be easily detected? The System seems able to pick up on it, which is lucky since it appears to be shielded. I haven't found any trace of it.
The issue then lay with how to access it.
As I can't find it, I can't breach whatever sNode is transferring data, which is a problem.
Rei wanted to get moving, but now that she knew for certain that she was being tracked, there seemed to be little point to it. Who knew what obstacles were already arranging themselves in her path?
But if the System can find the tracker, can I somehow use that to bridge the gap and allow me access?
It was the only way she could see herself successfully deactivating it, and she wasn't keen on the other option of removing it.
That would entail a forceful extraction of the cyberdeck by carving her own chest up to tear it out, something that would more likely than not leave her defenseless if it didn't just kill her outright.
Rei wiped away the blood still running down her nose, her mind made up as she focused it back toward the System.
Another battle of wills ensued.
Fortunately, it wasn't as hard this time, as she didn't want to alter the System in any way. All she wanted was deeper access to the data [Process#8uy4] had so kindly provided. The headache she was already plagued with grew fiercer, but she pressed on and eventually succeeded.
Now then, let's see where this data leads...
She followed the data stream with one thread of consciousness while the other kept a wary eye on her surroundings. A figure who'd risen from behind cover further into the alley had begun moving in her direction, but she wasn't sure if the unknown was moving toward her specifically or just in her direction yet.
The part of her mind riding the data stream followed it through the digital trail of nanites that supplied it, eventually finding herself blocked by ICE. It was much more advanced than anything she'd encountered in her body up to that point. If she had to judge, it looked like WolfMosh's work, and splicing the data within wouldn't be easy.
Yet, he hadn't trained her for over eight months, only for her to die due to an inability to overcome challenges.
Taking a risk, Rei forced both parts of her mind into splicing the ICE impeding her path, taking away most of her spatial awareness. The stranger was still about a hundred meters away by her estimation, meaning that as long as she finished quickly, she'd be in little danger from a surprise attack.
Time passed in a blur as she worked, the ICE impeding her with a stubbornness that she would have found infuriating hadn't one of her perks made her generally apathetic.
Rei actually began to hear steps closing in on her through the heavy downpour as she finally succeeded in splicing it and breached the tracker's inner confines, her headache having grown to near-debilitating levels and her body so hot she wouldn't be surprised if the rain soaking her had started steaming.
Now, to turn it off.
She'd want to go through all the data and delete everything so that there was no chance of it ever working again, but pressed for time, she simply expanded her ICE's coverage to begin shielding the tracker as well, keeping any of the data from leaving its confines.
At least, she hoped it would prevent any data from leaving and giving away her location further.
Feeling something grab her shoulder, Rei reacted instinctively. Her eyes snapped to the offender as they scanned for nodes. She breached, spliced, and then inserted a ton of junk data past the algorithms in the civilian-grade neural link made to prevent excessive data flow while one of her hands, holding a knife, moved to slit their throat.
She'd just begun registering what the young man had said as her knife parted flesh and his eyes rolled back into his skull — irreparable brain damage sustained.
He collapsed next to her, his body twitching slightly as blood pumped out of the slit neck in rhythmic spurts.
Did... did he just ask me if I was alright?
The concept that a stranger would care about her was so foreign that the whole situation was mystifying.
It must have been a plot, right? Or that's the most likely scenario, as he seems generally unkempt and was lurking in an alley. Just like I am, but still... Civilian-grade cybernetics, and just the bare minimum. He wouldn't have been a threat, meaning I overreacted.
She would have to ponder this later, as she'd gotten a new notification. Now that the issue of being tracked was most likely solved, she also needed to get moving.
She began running as fast as her body would allow as she read it over.
「Notice:
New skill learned.
[Melee Mastery, Level 1]
Governing attribute: Body
Description: From tooth and claw to clubs, swords, and spears, melee weaponry has always been an integral part of humanity's path to the top of the food chain. This skill helps with mastering weapons meant for melee combat.」
It wasn't the kill notification she'd expected, and upon reading the notification, Rei experienced an influx of information on a variety of weapons. It was very vague, though, and she had a feeling that the information would only come to her in full whenever she wielded an applicable weapon.
Rei switched her grip on each combat knife instinctively as the new skill came into full effect, her fingers finding better purchase and the angle of her wrist changing slightly to not strain her joints unnecessarily should she suddenly strike out.
If I didn't get a kill notification, does that mean the threat level was so low it didn't count, or did the System somehow pick up on his intentions and find them harmless?
Wouldn't that mean I just murdered an innocent?
It was another weight added to the mountain of suppressed emotions she'd have to deal with later — hopefully without mentally breaking.
A message suddenly came through her agent, and Rei opened it up. It was an address sent by Miyo.
I've been running vaguely northeast, and the address is south of Cyber Fang HQ. Typical.
It shouldn't be much of a problem if I call a cab, though, seeing as the tracker is most likely gone by now. It might even shake off any remaining pursuit as they probably won't expect me to double back the way I came.
Her mind made up, Rei checked her map for the closest road where a cab could possibly park temporarily to pick her up before she started moving in that direction.
Opening up the public mesh in her agent, she searched for an autonomous cab company operating through Zone 8 and found three large and many smaller ones.
Choosing the most prominent company, she ordered a cab to pick her up at the specified location and paid the frankly ludicrous fee to reserve one temporarily.
Something like instinct — perhaps spurred on by a suspicious rustle of trash or the movement of wind — made Rei suddenly jerk sideways, her long hair billowing from the aftershock caused by the fist moving past and drawing a line of blood across the side of her head from the metal fist's sharp edges.
That was not to incapacitate!
The unexpected attack had been powerful enough that Rei felt confident that it would have taken her head clean off. Spinning around only to see the focused face of what could only be another Piston member caused her some confusion.
They don't want to capture me any longer?
Rei didn't have time to consider the issue further as the man sprung for her again, moving so fast that he was no more than a blur to her vision. She tried dodging all the same, but the next piston-like fist still hit her shoulder.
More than just a few bones broke.
Rei was flung backward into a wall, her head crashing against it and making her black out for a second. She awoke a split second later when another fist impacted her sternum, shattering her ribs.
I'm going to die.
The thought was a catalyst that forced her mind into action, as adrenaline made time seem to slow down. She'd already dropped her knives when she was hit in the shoulder and flung into the wall, so melee combat was out — not that it was much of an option considering her opponent.
Rei put her whole brain into high gear while her cyberdeck whirred silently yet furiously as she began to breach node after node, trying her best to get through before the fist aiming for her head could get any closer.
She wasn't fast enough.
The ICE was on a completely different level compared to the goons she'd slain before, and something seemed to be actively fighting her off apart from the security protocols.
The fist was mere centimeters from her face when something unexpected happened:
It froze.
It wasn't her doing, and it seemingly wasn't the doing of her adversary, judging by his black eyes slowly widening in Rei's slowed perception of time.
No, whatever was fighting her off had interceded on her behalf, freezing the cybernetic limb with such precision that it halted completely mid-motion.
It didn't stop the man's inertia, though, and the force from his swing carried him forward, his fist smashing into Rei's face with force enough to break her nose for the second time that day but not hard enough to splatter her brain across the wall.
Rei didn't question the event, as her mind was wholly focused on its singular purpose:
Survival.
She had to breach and successfully splice the cyborg's implants to at least immobilize him. The brief period of time the force hampering her had spent halting the cybernetic limb gave her just enough of an opening.
Having broken through, she started tearing into the data, her body heating up to levels not reached before as she utilized her cyberdeck to the absolute limit of its capabilities.
It was barely enough, but at least it was enough.
All her adversary's limbs locked up, and Rei didn't hesitate to push off the wall to send herself and the man crashing onto the ground. Whatever force had been temporarily distracted was back to hampering her, doing its best to undo what she had done.
She fought it off with all she had while simultaneously rolling off the man to grab one of her combat knives with the arm not connected to a shattered shoulder.
Rolling on the shoulder had nearly caused enough suffering to make her lose concentration, but with survival on the line, she held fast.
Leaping back toward her adversary — who was doing his best to rise and meet her clumsy charge without much success — she brought the knife down with all she was worth toward the man's neck. There was resistance as some kind of weave just beneath the skin held her at bay, but she did manage to tear it somewhat.
Rei began to hack at it, unaware of the vicious grin slowly spreading across her face as her otherwise soulless eyes seemed to burn ever brighter in the dark.
Faster. FASTER!
She was losing ground against the force trying to reassert control over the man's implants, but the weave holding her knife at bay was likewise slowly losing its fight.
Finally piercing through, she dug her knife in as far as it could go, watching her enemy's eyes bulge as the blade pierced through flesh and then through his windpipe, reaching the spine.
It didn't separate the spine, though, so with a last desperate struggle, Rei flung herself down upon the combat knife's handle with her broken ribs, letting out a cry of agony as the blade pierced the last barrier.
The man twitched one last time.
She had severed the spinal column and perhaps even broken the neural link entwined with it.
「Notice:
[1] Adversaries neutralized.
Received: 200 Experience」
I survived?
Contrary to her notification, though, the man's limbs didn't remain still but began moving on their own. Even with [Merciless], Rei felt some alarm as one of the hands moved to grasp her throat. The force battling for control in the digital world hadn't let up, even with the man's death.
Rei disengaged by rolling backward just in time to dodge, leaving the knife behind while simultaneously disconnecting from the man's cyberware. Now that it had regained the upper hand, she'd noticed the force trying to breach her in turn.
She crawled away from the now flailing corpse, eyes fixed on it as her mind processed what she was seeing.
Someone must have been inside his cyberware — a Magi. They have full access to his cybernetics, meaning that as long as the core is supplying power, they can puppeteer it remotely.
Pushing through the pain, Rei got to her feet while still backing away from the corpse trying to stand up on its own. It didn't look like it would succeed, but Rei didn't want to bet on it.
She ran.
Already having a destination, she didn't bother with trying to shake off any pursuers with circuitous paths and made straight for it, her burning body screaming as her mind grew increasingly foggier.
I must reach the cab.
The sentence repeated in her mind like a mantra, and before she knew it, she was before a street with various vehicles speeding along it. She didn't even notice the people gawking at her as she connected to the cab and supplied the data verifying her as the one who'd ordered it.
Rei flopped inside, the cab door closing automatically behind her before a deep masculine voice said, "Please provide a destination."
She was still lucid enough to recognize the voice as belonging to the autonomous cab, and her eyes swirled silver for barely a split second as she supplied the address Miyo had given her.
"Thank you. Estimated time to arrival: 21 minutes and 30 seconds. Please provide the requested payment."
Rei did — her eyes flashing gold.
Rei's lungs were still working like bellows as the cab swerved off the sidewalk it had parked on and into traffic, its path taking it up a ramp toward one of the many skyways.
***
The head previously sitting on the desk was now nothing more than bloody mist and gore splattered across most of the office and Kiernan's face.
Kiernan himself lay twitching on the ground as waves of agony coursed through him, barely hearing the incoherent screams warbling out of already blown-out speakers. Every light source inside the office flickered in distress.
He'd only heard that one of his subordinates had gone for a killing blow on their target before dying. All he would ever remember of what came next was indescribable, rage-fueled torture and flickering lights.
Comments
Dynorion
I won't spoil anything, but not all fights will always be easy, so injury is inevitable.
Lazerus56
guess we getting more of that darkness inherently in cyberpunk type worlds. Interesting fight. Had an almost xianxia quality to it. Since she has healing should we expect he getting torn apart pretty frequently? Or is the baddie just that crazy?
Falxie
Awesome! TFTC :3
