I took a breath, and closed my eyes. Darkness filled my vision as I thought and rethought through the plan Viper and I ca up with. I half-expected her to just hand over a sche already complete. Instead, a chat window opened up and we spiraled into a several hour long back and forth where she helped work through a plan.
The eidolon brought information to the table, and filled in the gaps of my knowledge. It wasn’t just simple stuff, either. She had guard rotations, full rosters of rcenaries, word on which groups were planning what, and even groups we’d want to avoid. My plan, half-baked as it was, was allowed to fully cook with all the information she had on hand. It was a little scary, to be honest.
That was what brought here, to a back corner of the speakeasy. I’d called the squad in, and was ready to start filling them in. Luna was already down in my workshop with while I was setting up my Foundries and working on so tech for the job, so she was naturally the first to arrive.
The white-haired girl approached with a deck tucked under her arm. “The others?”
“They’re coming.” I sighed and stretched out. This was going to be a risky move, one that might even see so other group claiming the bounty. I had faith in the plan, though. “You get the everything I asked for?”
“All on here.” She slid a chip across the table to . I snatched it up and plugged it into a holo-puck.
The hidden door cracked open, and Saint appeared with a cup of coffee held in his hands. He blew on it lightly while looking around. His eyes narrowed when he spotted the two of us. “Are we having another party so soon?”
”I wish.” I tossed the puck into the middle of the table and turned it on. A headshot of Dorrin Gale popped up. “It’s a kidnapping this ti.”
”Oh.” He turned much more serious, and slid into the booth. “This guy… he’s the CEO of Tornado, right?”
I flicked my finger over the hologram, and the head spun around rapidly. ”Chek. Sentinel put a twenty mil bounty on his head. Alive.”
”… oh.” He frowned, and eyed . “How’d you manage to get in on a job that size? Fixer?”
”Straight from the source. Probably be all over the city by tonight.” The chip Brunhilde gave indicated the bounty would be passed around to the wider rc community tonight, anyway.
“It already is,” Luna spoke up. “The hidden nooks of the net are already exploding. Not everyday a payout of this scale is open as a free for all. I-I’m surprised you haven’t seen it yet, Saint.”
“I was getting a massage.” The reporter sighed. “Sounds like I missed a scoop, though. Which of their fixers is claiming it? Shields? Smith?”
“Shields,” Luna answered.
I watched the two of them talk. No idea who Shields or Smith were, but the way the two of them spoke, they seed like well-known figures. ‘Course, Sentinel wasn’t directly claiming the bounty. Although it was thinner than paper, they’d have plausible deniability with a fixer passing the job out instead. There was a reason most corporations kept their jobs hush hush, and open bounties like this weren’t super common. The only one I could think of that was even remotely like this was the job to find Sentinel’s briefcase.
The fact that they were even openly having one of their fixers pass around the job already indicated what they were thinking. Tornado was likely to fall soti in the near future unless one of the other Big 7 got involved.
“We’re not getting paid for this one—at least, not in Rayn. I’ll seriously owe you one, though.” I shrugged and tapped on the hologram projector. “You in?”
He didn’t imdiately answer, and instead just watched the floating hologram. Doing the job and not getting paid the 20 mil was asking for a lot. Saint took a slow sip of his coffee, and then sighed. “Is Mira?”
”Should be on her way here now.” I checked the Packheart Link. She’d just entered the apartnt building.
Saint nodded a couple tis. The light of the hologram illuminated half his face, leaving the rest hidden in the shadows. ”You feel confident in pulling this off?”
“I had so help putting together the plan. This is the most confident I’ve ever been.” There were plenty of spots where things could go wrong, but my contingencies were set. As long as everyone did their job, we’d be totally fine. “If you don’t like it, you can back out after.”
”Glad to hear it!” Mira called from the door. She had on the poncho I’d given her, and just beneath that a plate carrier. “Is this another patented Shiro Sche?”
”Chek. This one’s actually patented, though.” It blew my earlier stuff out of the water. If nothing else, the 75 EF cost was worth it to see and learn how a master made sches.
Mira slid in next to Luna. “Did you bring enough to share, Saint?”
”Get your own.” The reporter carefully protected his coffee cup, and shot a glare at my mikata. “We’re going to be broke after this one anyway. Can’t believe you want to do this for no pay.”
“The pay’s a lot more important than just rayn.” It was full forgiveness for the whole stealing the blueprints thing. I thought I got rid of that particular scythe dangling over my head. Hopefully, after this, it’d be gone for good.
“If you say so.” Saint just sipped at his coffee. He didn’t seem entirely willing to give up a 20 mil bounty, and honestly, I couldn’t bla him.
“There’s so water in the kitchen.” And a couple sodas leftover from Mira’s party last night. “Half your cake is still in there, too.”
”Oh! I’ll go grab it later.” She licked her lips and winked at . “We ready to start, oh fearless leader?”
”If you guys are.” I glanced between all of them, and then sat up a bit straighter. “As you’re aware, our job this ti around is to kidnap Dorrin Gale, the CEO of Tornado Arms.”
”Fucker,” Mira muttered under her breath.
“He’s coming to Aythryn City in a day and a half. We need to move quickly for this. If we go too slow, so other team will bag him.” The ti limit was my biggest worry. We had a lot to do in such a short amount of ti. “The plan is to make our move the night after tomorrow."
“Give him a day to settle in?” Saint tapped his finger against his coffee cup. ”Not the worst ti crunch I’ve been in.”
“Thanks for the vote of confidence. Anyway, this guy is staying in a fortress. I have it on good authority that there’ll be at least five hundred PMCs playing defense, and that’s not including Tornado's internal security and nad rcs.” That bit of intel ca from Viper. The number of rcs being hired was only climbing though, so that figure was probably outdated.
”Do we know where he’s staying?” Luna asked.
”Here.” I zood in on the map of Aythryn City to a small island just inside of the bay area. A sleek mixture of a bunker and a sprawling mansion was built onto it complete with courtyards and everything. “It’s one of the council’s places. Heavily fortified, with everything from AA turrets to a submarine that patrols the area.”
”A submarine?” Mira’s halo pulsed brightly. “Why the hell would they need a submarine?”
”Other than it being cool?” I coughed lightly, and pulled away from the map. “You know how the oceans are these days. It’s there in case sothing gets past the REEF. We shouldn’t have to worry about it.”
“Phew.” Mira wiped at her forehead dramatically. “For a mont there, I thought you’d be telling us we were going by boat.”
”Even I’m not that crazy.” My actual plan wasn’t much better though.
Mira shrugged. ”Seriously though. Talk about a waste of tax payer rayn… how much does the council get paid?”
“Not enough to buy a submarine.” Saint helpfully inford us. “Then again, are you really surprised?”
”Not in the slightest.”
“Right, so, if that isn’t enough to scare us off, this job is likely being passed around every rc dive in the city at the mont.” I took a breath and paused for effect. “The infinite tides of the hopeful and desperate will all be moving for this. Not to ntion any gang looking for a leg up.”
“I don’t know, Shiro.” Saint shook his head. “Getting everything done in, what, two and a half days? We won’t have the ti.”
“It’ll be enough if we move quick.” I already had my tech and Foundries blitzing away to create everything we’d need. We couldn’t wait too long either. “Luna, did you save the subroutines from the Industry Friends?”
Luna frowned. “Yeah… I’ll send them to you.”
”Nova.” That shaved off a large part of my concerns. The pieces were slowly coming together. Once everything was done crafting down below, I’d have a hell of a couple days ahead of to get everything ready. Right, I should drop back by the Crusade and grab so stims.
Mira frowned and rubbed at her halo lightly. It’d been glowing nonstop since she first arrived. “Even if we grab him, we’ll be surrounded by water on all sides without any way out. It’ll be impossible to lose pursuers.”
“That’s what they’ll be thinking too.” I failed to suppress a grin. The escape was actually my idea entirely, though Viper did shore up the gaps. If everything went well, we’d sneak out right in front of their eyes.
“Still, attacking him outright is suicide,” Mira said. “We so sort of diversion planned? All that security’s be looking right at us.”
“That’s where Saint cos in. Or should I say City of Sorrows?” I smirked, and a new hologram churned to life. It was an old school MMORPG. “You guys heard of a first clear race?”
”You don’t an…” Saint paused for a mont, and slowly nodded his head. “Stir the rcs into a frenzy? The last stream of the Scath Heights did do exceptionally well.”
“Exactly.” I held my hand up to one of the lights along the wall, creating a dense shadow. “And we’ll do our work just under the lamp. They won’t have any other choice but to focus where we want them to.”
“That could work.” The man sipped at his coffee cup. “Looks like we’ll make so money from this after all. It’ll be chump change compared to twenty mil, though.”
“That still doesn’t answer how we’re going to get past all the security, nab the guy without killing him, and then go back through security without being stopped,” Luna said. “You haven’t even ntioned the net defenses.”
“Tornado brought their own runners.” I shrugged. “They wanted to keep that side of things in house.”
“Smart… it’ll still be impossible to get past it all without dying.” Luna left no room to doubt what she thought of our chances.
“So we’re screwed then.” Saint set his coffee cup down. “No way into the fortress, and even if we got in, there’d be no way out.”
“Not quite.” I zood out on the map until it showed the entire port of Aythryn City. “We have a chance as long as the cards play in our favor.”
”Well go on then.” Mira leaned forward in her seat. “If you’re trying to kill us with suspense, it’s working.”
“It’s simple, really,” I said. “Like Luna said, running off with the CEO while he’s under so much security would normally be impossible. What if the security team themselves handed Dorrin over to us, though?”
Mira instantly shot what I was suggesting down. “No way they’d just hand over their CEO to a bunch of strangers.”
”Ah, but there’s where you’re wrong. Better the devil you know, chek?” I flicked my finger, and the hologram morphed. Understanding flashed across their faces, and I quickly walked them through the rest of my master sche.
Compared to the last ti I shared a plan with them, they asked dozens of questions. It was for the best. I’d rather have a crew that thought things through than one that just blindly followed orders. The prior was much more likely to survive, and it’d keep us from having another incident like with Mikey Mays.
By the end of the explanation, all three of them sat in silence around the table. Luna had a speculative look on her face, and Mira… well, she just looked happy to be here. The brilliant pulses of her halo gave away just how much she was thinking about this, though. Saint just tapped his coffee cup idly against the table.
After letting them think about it for a mont, I turned my attention to the runner. “Luna, think you can pull off your end?”
”Shouldn’t be a problem.” She pulled out her deck and got to work right away. “I’ll have to stay to interface with the relay, though. This kind of thing—I’ll need to be there in person. I-I don’t know how to control the flyer, either.”
”I’ll teach you.” It wouldn't be that hard. Although Driving’s Air Vehicles Perk mostly went unused, it’d be earning its stripes this ti around.
Luna knowing how to fly was extrely important to the success of the plan. When the ti ca, it’d be all hands on deck. Teaching her to fly… I’d have to slot it in just after the preparatory heist and between my crafting binge to get everything ready. The window was tight—almost too tight.
“It’s crazy… it might work, though.” Luna sighed in resignation. “I’m in. Not like I have another choice, anyway.”
“I can pass you the rest of my rayn if you want to part ways here.” I didn’t want her to only do this because she felt like she had no choice. Even if we succeeded, that’d be a good way to cause resentnt to start building up.
“I… I have nowhere to go, anyway.” Luna shook her head. “And if we do pull this off, we’ll be legends. A known na might make finding my brother easier.”
“That… hopefully, our nas won’t be known.” Otherwise it’d defeat the whole purpose of the later parts of my plan.
“You know I’m in.” Mira smirked. “No way I’d let you charge into sowhere like this without any backup.”
“Ah, what the hell?” Saint crumpled his coffee cup and stood up. “You only live once, right? I’m in.”
“Nova.” I scooted around the booth, and followed up after the reporter. I was a bit worried one of them wouldn’t want to go for it and I’d have to find a different person to fill in, but it appeared my trust hadn’t been misplaced. “Mira, you’re with . We need to break in tonight. Luna—“
”Yeah, yeah.” She waved a hand. Her head was already buried in the deck. “Take Vox with you. I’ll watch from here while reprogramming the IFs.”
”Everyone knows their roles?” I glanced around my rry band of psychos. Each and every one of them was truly crazy to agree with my plan so easily. “Then let’s get to work.”
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