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"Remember our mission. We're not here for revenge against the Raffen Shiv; we're here for the 800,000 eddies!" Maine's voice was a low, disciplined growl over the comms. "If Jax can ghost in and lift the unit without waking the whole hive, we take the win and run. If not... well, keep your fingers on the triggers."
"Lucy, status on the head-count?"
"Wait. I need more time to breach the subnet."
In the back of the armored van, Lucy had the monowire cable pulled from her wrist, plugged directly into a portable deck. Her eyes were closed, her consciousness drifting through the neon-grid of the local cyberspace.
Every hacker's virtual landscape was a reflection of their psyche. Kiwi's was a brutal, monolithic steel city; Sasha's was a chaotic, rainbow-colored cat sanctuary. Lucy's world was a vast, silent bridge of light over a void of rushing data. Standing in that empty expanse, her digital avatar swiped a hand through the air, filtering through the encrypted noise of the factory's internal network. She reached out, grasping a glowing red thread of data and forcing a connection.
"I'm in. Accessing the internal security feed now," Lucy whispered, her voice echoing in the crew's ears. "Within forty meters of Jax, I count twelve hostiles. Give me a second to scan the inventory logs."
"Priority is the box, Jax. Hold your position until Lucy pings the location," Maine ordered.
"Understood," Jax replied, pressing his back against the cold corrugated metal of the outer wall, his breath hitching as a sentry's flashlight beam swept the gravel inches from his boots.
Moments later, Lucy's voice returned. "Based on the internal routing, the unit is in one of three spots: the second-floor control room, the back of Pilar's car in the garage, or the third-floor executive office. The office is a blind spot—no cameras. Proceed with caution."
"Copy that. Moving in."
Jax didn't move like a normal human. He sprang upward, his fingers digging into a rusted protrusion three meters above the ground. He hauled himself up to the ventilation window, his muscles silent and efficient.
He peered through the rotating fan blades, mapping the interior. This wasn't a video game; there were no glowing icons to tell him where people were looking. A single scuff of his boot or the smell of his sweat could give him away.
"Lucy," Jax whispered. "Blind the camera over the main gate and the stairs to the second floor. Do it now."
"Done. You have a thirty-second loop. Go."
Jax dropped from the vent, his body a shadow against the darkness. He hit the ground in a silent roll and sprinted toward the four-meter-wide main gate. Two Raffen sentries stood there, sharing a synthetic cigarette. One turned away to light a drug-inhaler, creating a split-second window. Jax blurred past them, a gust of wind they mistook for a desert breeze.
"Damn, the wind's biting tonight," one growled.
"Always is. At least it brought us that Arasaka payout. Imagine... a whole fortune for a couple of dead animals. Corpos are lunatics."
Jax ignored the chatter, already inside the factory. He moved through a forest of abandoned machinery. He spotted a sentry leaning against a pillar, the tip of his cigarette glowing in the dark.
Jax's calf muscles bulged under his trousers. He lunged.
"Hmm?"
The sentry heard the displaced air a fraction of a second too late. He started to turn, but Jax's hand was already clamped over his mouth, an iron-tight arm snaked around his throat. Jax looked into the man's widening eyes, his baseball cap shadowing his own indifferent gaze.
"One," Jax whispered.
He lowered the body silently behind a massive press-machine. He looked up at the rusted catwalk of the second floor. The hunt was just beginning.
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