The Warehouse

Mr_DC

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Once, it had been a bustling freight warehouse, receiving, processing, storing and distributing goods and parts for factories and stores all across Nevereign, that was 20 years ago. These days it's a ruined husk sitting in the middle of one of Nevereign's worst slum districts, prime real estate for gangers, drifters, junkies and, most recently, anarchists. Crumbling brick and rusting steel shelters the hideout of the 'Bloody Murder' group, as it has done for three years now. Boarded up windows hide the interior from prying eyes, though sounds of life can, upon occasion, be heard from within.
 
Required Listening


Thump


Thump


Thump


The rhythmic pounding echoed through the warehouse, reverberating off the concrete and scrap metal walls, like a well timed sound track, one dull bang every second and a half.


Thump


Thump


Thump


Every night, at exactly 8:23 PM, the pounding began.


Thump


Thump


Thump


It continued, unceasing, uninterrupted, for exactly thirty-seven minutes.


Thump


Thump


Thump


Occasionally passersby would stop briefly, wondering what the noise was, listening as the pounding continued. Locals had long running bets as to what was making the noise, though none of them were brave or foolish enough to actually try and find out.


Thump


Thump


Thump


The hulking giant stood alone in his corner, a heavy brown boxing bag in front of him.


Thump


Thump


Thump


A mass of chrome and steel, silent but for the heavy booms as his cybernetic fists connected with the synthetic bag.


Thump


Thump


Thump.


His face was blank, utterly devoid of expression as his fists hit again and again.


Thump


Thump


Thump


Cold, synthetic eyes stared dead ahead, completely focused on the bag in front of him.


Thump


Thump


Thump


The rhythm of the routine felt good, reassuring. 


One, Thump


Three, Thump


Seven, Thump


The heavy impacts of the blows echoing through his steel arms, all the way through the sensors back to his fleshy torso.


One, Thump


Three, Thump


Seven, Thump


The giant breathed deeply, and stopped. The time clock in the corner of his eye read 8:58 PM, two minutes early. His weight shifted as he launched into flurry of rapid paced blows.


Thumpthumpthumpthumpthumpthump


Lashing out with a storm of punches and kicks against the hapless brow bag, connecting again and again with impacts that would kill a man.


Thumpthumpthumpthumpthumpthump


With a resounding, animalistic roar he smashed his fist into the bag one last time, with a load metallic snap the chain holding the bag to the ceiling broke, causing the bag to drop like a lead-weight as bits of chain scattered across the area, clattering away as they came to rest on the floor. In the corner of his cybereye the clock changed, 8:59 PM.


Gregory Stanner gazed blankly around the empty, silent warehouse, feeling..... Well, empty. His head felt.... Hazy, groggy, like something was clouding up his thought processes. Moving, slowly, sluggishly, he walked from the corner of the warehouse that contained his workout gear. Not that staying in shape mattered much to a man whose muscles were mostly servomotors at this point, but the exercise felt nice, rhythmic, relaxing...... Relaxing, the word echoed in his mind, relaxing, so hard to relax... Exercise helped though, a little.


Slowly, like a man half-asleep, Greg made his way across the warehouse, uncertain of what he was looking for. His eyes danced across the various bits and bobs that occupied the place, a scavenged couch, a repaired trid player, this and that, eventually his aimless search led him to a shipping pallet half stacked with cases upon cases of beer, a pack of cigarettes and a lighter sat on top of the pallet. Something clicked inside Greg's head as his gaze wandered over the cardboard casing, relaxing, relaxing, cigarettes helped with relaxing right?


A few fumbling attempts later and the bundle of paper and synthetic tobacco was burning away, followed by a second, and then a third. Somewhere in the haze of his mind, Greg felt..... Calmer.... Like an attic window being opened for the first time in years, the draft slowly carrying out the dust and the fog.


Relaxing, relaxing, the word echoed in his head as he lit up a fifth cigarette.


@The Glass Ninja  @admiral9
 
The leather glove made the meaty impact of Gabriel's fist into the face of the corporate goon mingle with a crackle of the tough fabric over his clenched knuckles. The man who probably thought he looked casual in his leather jacket and jeans went down like a sack of bricks, slamming back against the wall of the alley he'd been stupid enough to follow the suited contractor down. Gabriel felt his tongue flicker out over his lips as the man scrabbled for a commlink at his ear, whimpering as he stared up at the anarchist - eyes wide with terror. He'd barely gotten his hand halfway to his ear before a fluid kick broke a wrist and set the goon to screaming. "Screaming bloody murder eh?" It came out Bluddy Murdur - followed by a chuckle - as Gabriel dropped his act, the smooth accent barely hinting at his origins falling away as blood lust began to intoxicate him. The next kick forced the corporate spy to spit out a few teeth across the alleyway, as well as a gobbet of blood; barely recovered, he wasn't expecting another stately shoe to smash into his bottom rib, piercing it through. 


"Now, I know you were doing a job and all, but you don't follow me. No one follows me." He was back to that formal tone, his voice smooth and businesslike. Another few kicks into the cowering thing's midriff and he'd had his fun. Tutting slightly and straightening his rumpled suit jacket and shirt cuffs Gabriel let an easy smile cross his face. "Now, you've got a choice. Quick, or slow. Slow, I beat you to death with my fists right here. Pop your eyes like balloons. Maybe tear out your lungs by the nostrils." He was kidding, of course. He'd not want to get a fine suit like the Berwick wrapped tight over his broad shoulders dirty with the piece of shit whimpering at his feet. His fine Italian leather shoes were already scuffed - he'd need to spend some time shining them up later. "Or" The hostec appeared in his hands almost like magic, the short barrel revolver hanging loosely in his grip "We do this quick. I put one between your eyes and we're all done! How easy..." A flash of the eyes, just for a moment, made his smile seem something more than predatory. Almost friendly. 


That's when he shot out one of the man's kneecaps. "Oh, I'm so sorry...ah canny help maself, you scream like a wee pig." The second kneecap came away just as easily, the smoking pistol rocking his steady arm back as it obliterated the goon's natural ability to walk forever. No one would notice the short, sharp reports of the little pistol out here, Gabriel knew. The cops avoided this part of the slums like the plague, and the gangers were too busy killing each other to go looking for trouble. He had time to enjoy the man's screaming till it stopped, crouching there in a newly blooded alleyway until it finally became soft whimpers into the concrete. "Awch, that aw? Too bad..." muttered the anarchist, standing up to smile down at his victim one last time. It turned to a vicious grimace as the man started to crawl, the final report of the gun leaving a steaming hollow where the back of his skull had been - the hard stopping power of the little gun obliterating everything from the brain forwards and pasting his face onto the ground. 

Breathing softly, all the tension of the day flowing out of him, Gabriel let out a sight and flicked on his cybernetic eye's scanning functions with a mental shunt. There was nothing to detect, no signal broadcasting from the dead mook and now that his eye was properly cycling through a few vision spectrums he saw how the blood had splattered all over the place. It looked perfectly like a gang killing, just as planned. Whistling slightly, he turned on his heel an strolled from the stinking alleyway into what used to be a bustling industrial estate - the long roads cutting straight lines between old factories and warehouses, gloomy windows that had been smashed years before staring down into the street with the thousand yard stare of a depressive. Gabe started to walk, slowly enough, enjoying a leisurely pace as he went first down the street and then left - it took another hour before he got where he was going even after pulling himself aboard a shitty old tram and slamming himself down between a raggedy junkie and what might've been a street urchin beneath a pile of rags. A gang had set the tram up as quick transport around the slums; for a price of course, nothing was free from those guys. Not one of the other passengers looked at him  even  when he glanced in their direction - you didn't look at a suit with a pair of hard eyes and a smile out here unless you wanted trouble.


He hopped off the rattling transport, its rusty wheels screeching on old track and its flaking paint fluttering down onto the road as it went away on its path to pick up more people desperate enough to hand over a few credits to the extortive old Korean lady at the controls. Gabriel vaguely registered the screeching getting farther away as he turned off from his stop to start down a twist of alleyways, a few rights and lefts eventually bringing him to the back of a run down warehouse - as a contrast to everywhere else in this dump that was the slums, a heavy security door hung on new hinges just at the back - Gabe had bought that, not sure he wanted people able to just walk into his home away from home - and a big 'FUCK OFF' spraypainted above the reinforced steel drove the message home that you weren't getting in without someone's permission. He waved his hand in front of the door, the implanted key-chip sliding the deadbolts inside the frame back and swinging the big thing open - admitting him to what he affectionately called the foyer. It was actually just a long hallway with a few fixed up halogen lights in the ceiling and flak-tack boarding on the walls to stop someone just firing a few rounds through. That'd been one of the original problems when he found the place. Gangers didn't like it when you took their territory. 

He shut the door behind him, relocking the bolts, and started down the corridor till he turned out into the warehouse proper. The place was a block of clean floor - more of his handiwork - cabling and random crap he and his boys had gathered over time. A few of the rest of Bloody Murder were out of the city just now, but their bunks and little partitions sat over in the corner untouched - Bihn was probably somewhere fucking around with the net and knowing Tin- He caught himself. Greg - Greg who'd probably be off burning something. He kicked himself again, refocusing his mind: Big Guy was called Greg, not fucking 'Tiny'. "Fuck you, Bihn." Gabe muttered under his breath. The shitty little Korean had a habit of using nicknames incessantly and they tended to catch on. Kid wasn't so bad once you got used to him but sometimes he needed a boot up the arse. 

"Hey, guys! You here? Bihn I need some info and some people tracked! Greg, we might get to burn some shit!" 
 
Greg, well onto his ninth cigarette, was vaguely aware of his name being called from the back of the warehouse, it took his brain a moment to process this fact. It took his brain another moment to process the fact that if someone was calling his name they probably weren't here to kill him and retract his cyberblades.


"That you boss?" He asked after several seconds, his tone flat and lifeless. Greg couldn't think of anyone else who'd be calling out for him, well, not anyone that called him by name.
 
Binh took a nice deep breath, the beautiful smog filled morning air filled his lungs along with the smell of industrial filth intermingled with sewage rushing into his nostrils. He was standing in front of the ruined structure he called home, planked shut windows and a large, held together by chains and bolted plates entryway. Casa el puta as he called it... not that he knew what that last word meant but some latino gangster once called him that so he was sure it had to be something positive.


leaning against the wall he made sure to make eye contact with any pedestrian that happened to be walking by, his stare leaving his eternally present sunglasses, but somehow, none reciprocated. After making sure there was no face he recognized and no people were hanging around him for too long he considered the situation safe, safe enough to eat breakfast at least.


Fishing out a small paper bag containing a small piece of bread, covered in green spots that might be mold, but it was edible enough. Consuming his meal with a chaser of beer that he stole from Tiny's stash, he appreciated the fact that the bread still had taste and the flavor of the absolutely horrid alcohol accentuated it to transform it into something roughly equivalent to food.


Two minutes and some worrying stomach rumbling later Binh was ready to start the day, lighting one of his special morning joints he went for a small patrol to make sure none of the surrounding areas had been infiltrated by government assets. Binh was a big pot smoker, and one might say that it wasn't smart for an already paranoid person to use high sativa weed but it was what provided him with his genius creativity and truly, it was nothing but lies created by quacks wanting to hide the truths from the populace anyways. Merely worshiping their government masters.


"Holy shit, that'd be a sick rap actually." Binh's genius once again started working at full throttle lyrics for his new masterpiece formulating in his mind, he needed a second opinion though...


Luckily these streets were his home by now and he knew where he could find some people.


Between a pair of desolate half collapsed buildings pretending to be apartments there was an alleyway, this alleyway was sometimes used by people in a particular hurry, hence it was the perfect place to... "borrow" someones time. Hidden in the eternal shade and smog, riddled with garbage and debris there were plenty of hiding positions to wait, luckily though there was not too much waiting to be had.


Binh heard footsteps, rapid ones at that, someone was running.


This someone turned out to be a ganger, one that appeared to have been lucky enough to take a route his apparent pursuers weren't aware of existing at least, that's what Binh could make up from the significantly louder sound of shouting not moving towards them.



Pulling out his tazer binh awaited the person, who appeared to be a man in his early 20's to run by him. Quickly jumping into action the short range allowed an instant knock out after being hit by the high voltage darts, followed by the man collapsing to the ground like a sack of potatoes. Binh dragged the man, with significant effort and tripping more then once thanks to the fact that he barely saw what was in front of him. He finally managed to get the man leaning against a wall, his arms and legs bound.


It took a couple of minutes and a bunch of kicks to the gut for the man to wake up. "Yo dude, wazzup? You awake n shit?" Binh inquired, puffing a cloud of smoke in his face seconds after as a way of showing his concern.


"*Cough* What.... what the fuck *cough cough*" the man, still in agony and struggling to breathe stammered out, the man appeared to be more then healthy!


"You seem to be fine I see, great! Yo so here´s the deal man I got like this fire new rap and I want to hear what you think, depending on what you say i might even allow you to buy my album afterwards! Fucking blazed deal amirite dude?" Binh ecstatically proclaimed, before the man, who appeared to mainly want to ask why he was bound and looked more pissed then intrigued got the chance to talk though binh began. Playing one of his homemade beats to set the mood.


"Higher consciousness truth I'll be reachin for it
Has assumed the truth and I know I'll find it

I'm The Truth like A.I. got the proof
Erm what comes next again..." Binh stopped after stuttering trying to find a word he could use... he reverted to a simple but eternally cool one, he was rocking this shit anyways. 
"stay fly!

Bring truth to the light
See through the truth and them lies homie
I used to take it home to write some of my own
But my family's too broke to move or find shelter
Hey yo big!?
See through the truth and them lies homie
Mary J blige
Fuck it all yo, the governments hiding it anyways"


Silence, the bound man just looked at Binh with a blank face, there was no ridicule on that face, it was beneath ridicule. The face showed simple empathy, empathy for someone that was not worthy of being laughed at, not worthy of even getting critiqued... truly an organism so deplorable he could barely be considered human.


The man minutes later managed to let out a single snicker, that snicker turned to laughter, he had not laughed like this in all his life for he had met truly the worst of the worst. He now realized why he bothered living, at least he wasn't this bad... He had something going for him even if he was a ganger underling at least he wasn't Binh.


This was a face Binh was very familiar with, he had seen it before... once again it appeared his genius was not understood, another human life that did not understand greatness. Such a waste.


Binh regretted that he had no knife now, instead he had to look around for something usable, eventually finding a shard of glass he could use. He squatted next to the ganger, a smile on his face. "You know, dude, I think you and I had a misunderstanding, that's fine yo, I'll just end our encounter and we'll go our separate ways." Binh stood up, took one last look at the guy and force the glass shard into his neck, atleast.... He thought he did. The ganger managed to lift his hands, apparently not as bound as binh thought and block the shard instead it sliced his hands, and the cloth used to bind him.


"Fuck shit fuck! God damn it!" Binh cursed as he realized he was in quite a bad position, the guy could easily best him in physical violence and with their close proximity he wouldn't need his legs to restrain binh, panicking he pulled out his way oversized revolver jumping back at the same time, after cocking the hammer he fired.


Forgetting that he wasn't using his cybernetic arm he was shocked by the ridiculous recoil and he only managed to graze the kneecap of his target.


"Aah fuck! I'm gonna kill you once I get to you dwarf!"


Binh rapidly switched to his other hand and successfully finished him off with a shot to the heart, realizing the sound he made he quickly got out of dodge.


"Whew, now that was a fun little journey, great shooting practice too!" whistling on his way back to base Binh reflected on his little escapade.


He entered the base, having lit a second join to calm himself down he secured the locks again as he heard G-man requesting his presence.


"Yo G-man whaddup?" Binh approached his boss and buddy curious as to what the job would be.
 
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@admiral9


Bihn's senses were overwhelmed. Vision a flood of colors, ears ringing, Earth spinning. It was a hack attempt on the infochip in his mind.


Good evening.


An impossibly successful hack attempt.


You're the hacker in this little group, aren't you?


 


Plug yourself into whatever speaker system you have around here, hackerman.


 


I don't want to throw words into your head as a conversation. Brain death can be tricky.


 


Whoever it was, they literally hacked the man's mind. It was the stuff of legends among those who hacked for a living. Someone had to have the strongest corporate systems behind them or someone with a brand new virus - A powerful one.
 
"FUCKING GOVERNMENT AGAIN, WE'RE FUCKING COMPROMISED FUCKSAKE GOD DAMN IT FUCK IT!" Binh, had been confronted with his actual worst nightmare. There was no time and so contingency plan 6B-subset 667 came into action, the infiltration of his mental capacities by a corporate-governmental entity had taken place, most likely by an interdimensional organism influenced shifter wanting to brainwash him and corrupt him too, there was no time and so he immediately cut off all outgoing signals from his cybernetics.


"I'm a danger for us all man! The governments on to me dude, there's no time before the fucking shifters crash through the door we gotta evacuate! Initiating hard reset!" These were the lasts words Binh spoke, to ensure no virus would be left in his cybernetics he would initiate a hard reset to a previous point in time. A process that would take a couple of hours and would have him be unconscious in the process.
 
@admiral9 @The Glass Ninja @Cashdash25


[SIZE= 16px]Jesus. [/SIZE]


 


A voice boomed through every speaker in the building, including phones. Even the screens showed the words being said.


[SIZE= 16px]I didn't think he would be that insane.[/SIZE]


 


The voice was electronically distorted, making it unknown who is talking.


[SIZE= 16px]Are the rest of you going to go like popcorn or can I continue talking?[/SIZE]
 
As soon as Binh shouted the word 'compromised' Greg was in action, his Auto-Injectors pumping pure adrenaline directly into his system, his reflexive wiring kicking off and launch him into motion.


His shotgun materialized in his hands, his PDA disintegrating in a hail of lead to prevent them using it to track his movements. Emotions bled into his words as every electronic in the warehouse started echoing a hostile's voice, "BOSS, ESCAPE VECTOR, NOW!"


His shotgun boomed again as he took out the TV and the Trid-player. He dived behind the couch and quickly scanned the windows for any sign of the attackers.
 
He had just greeted his friends when the shooting started. Gabe closed his eyes for a moment, a sigh escaping his lips as he heard the boom of a voice through the speaker system he didn't know they had - probably something Bihn had done in his mad need to share his terrible mixtape with the rest of the world. The thought was fleeting as his pistol almost seemed to materialise in his hand - the revolver's green ready light telling him instantly that there was a round in the chamber ready to tear whatever got in his way to pieces. 

He had had a plan, five minutes ago, and a good one. Now his hacker was a twitching heap on the floor and his muscle was busy blowing the shit out of whatever electronics he could see. Who the fuck was stupid enough to try negotiating with a secret group through anyone other than their leader? Diving forward - slipping under the cone of Greg's shotgun that his eye sketched in the air to get to the wiry little Korean. He'd known the little fucker was crazy paranoid but hard-resetting was a near crazy move; at least he'd not offed himself. Grabbing the little man and throwing him over his shoulder, he half crouched half sprinted to the terminal that Bihn had set up back when they'd first taken this place - slamming his fist onto a red button. Immediately his commlink buzzed out a code, and he knew that every member of Bloody Murder no matter where they were knew that the Nevereign HQ was compromised. 

The button also popped open a hatch at the bottom of the terminal, and laying his gun on the keyboard for just a moment he reached in to grab a duffel bag from inside - turning and bodily tossing it towards Greg before gathering up the other two bug-out kits. "Greg!" Gabe roared, his accent in full flow "Blow tha fookin place! Burn it aw! Nay trace!". Laden as he was with his human burden and the heavy bags, he charged back across the room towards the back door - they'd need to get out of here quick and across town to the backup safehouse. 
 
Greg, grinning like the madman he was, vaulted his upholstered cover, snatched the dufflebag that held his combat gear and casually emptied the rest of his shotgun rounds into Binh's computer. Trading his shotgun for his rifle he moved through the warehouse, shooting out electronics as he went, making his way towards the 'armory'.


It wasn't much of an armory, especially to a former soldier who'd been inside actual ones, but the stacks of stolen footlockers piled high with ammunition, explosives and backup weapons, crammed into a walled off section of the warehouse, was close enough for their purposes. Kicking in the door, he grabbed his second bugout bag, hanging on a hook next to the door, and proceeded to smash, dump out, kick over or otherwise scatter every footlocker, molotov bottle and random box in the room before grabbing a gas can, yanking the cap off, and trailing gasoline all the way to the loading dock where his truck was parked.


The two bags slung over his shoulder joined his third emergency kit in the back of the truck as he lit off the gas trail, the fire reflected in his metal eyes, showing a glimpse of the deranged man inside. He stared as the flames raced back towards the armory, giggling to himself as the fire started to grow. The first pieces of ammo were starting to cook off, filling the air with little bangs as they exploded, and Greg decided escape was the better part of pyromania. The rusty old truck started on the first try mercifully, good thing they'd replaced the starter last week, and tore out of the loading dock.


The sheet metal roll up door offered little resistance, its rusty bulk giving way as the truck hit, tearing out into the small parking area outside of it before racing out onto the road itself.
 
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Six hours later, Greg sat in the dingy corner booth at a 24-hour diner on the other side of Nevereign, absentmindedly eating an incredibly tasteless burger while watching a live news broadcast of an explosion at a suspected meth lab in an abandoned warehouse. He'd slipped back into the dark, the rush of emotions having long faded as he criss-crossed the city, taking random turns and stops to throw off any pursuers, he was fairly certain he hadn't been followed but it was always worth making sure...........


Which is why the truck was currently sitting in an abandoned lot on the other side of town with a primed grenade taped to the doors and a three year old sedan formally occupied by a pair of college kids, who really should have known better than to have sex in a parking garage when Greg was looking for a car to steal, was sitting outside the diner.


Greg put down the burger, which somehow managed to be completely tasteless, and picked up the disposable commlink sitting on the table. The utterly generic, grey plastic phone replacement was as cheap as they came, less than five bucks at any gas station in Nevereign, paid in cash and preloaded with a token amount of minutes they were completely untraceable to the buyer, every criminal, witness and wannabe vigilante's best friend. Bloody Murder bought them by the case.


He punched in the number he had long ago memorized and quietly hoped whoever was onto them didn't know about the back up location, or if they did at least didn't know to tap the phone there. As the phone rang he idly wondered if his comrades had made it out of the blast radius alright, they probably had, but there was always the chance they hadn't shaken their pursuers and made it to the safehouse, or if they had then it was trapped and they'd been captured, well, that's what code phrases were for.
 
@Cashdash25


"The burger tastes good?" A scrawny man walked up. He sounded like he had a donut in his mouth or like his tongue was severely swollen. His T-shirt with the cover of some hit game was stained with the remains of whatever junk food he was having recently. Half of his head was shaved, giving a good view of his ports. The number of them made it clear that it was how he made a living.


The other side of his head was covered by long, black hair which probably wasn't washed in months.


He grinned, showing his crooked yellow teeth, most of them missing. "Shouldn't be surprised if you spend the rest of the evening on the toilet, eh?" He laughed, a sound of a dog crying after someone stepped on its tail. He leaned on the table, his arms like twigs. His veins were black and thin, a wounded mess caused by whatever his drug of choice was. "I'm Lee." He continued, still keeping a grin as one of his eyes started twitching. "You come here often?" His grin grew wider and his 'accent' cleared slightly, making him at least somewhat understandable.


(I suggest you reply next in 'Nevereign (General)' topic because that's where all minor, unlisted locations are, like this diner.)
 
"Dafuq yu smoking I'm uncultured?" "Yo why's that dog not eaten yet" "Someone clothe that man already!" Shouts and screams were entering Binh's mind, some pointed towards him but he paid them no heed.


After all, he was enjoying a leisurely walk through the streets of nevereign. The summer sky and the wide streets stretching out infront of him. He was on his way to perform at his first big concert, an attendance of several tens of thousands was planned, the fact being that he had made his big breakthrough. The sprawling area prepared for his show was all ready and he was so close to fulfilling his... dreams?


Why was he here to begin with, was it maybe a ruse... nevereign had no sun did it?


He was sure that the concert was real, him making a breakthrough was not the odd thing... instead it was the dog.


A good point was made after all, why was that dog not eaten yet. "Tried to fool me again didn't you CORPS!" Binh shouted before moving his flabby mess of a body towards a position of cover.


"Where are you, come out so I can show you what I think of your foolish plans!" There was none that responded.


"I thought so, you're scared aren't you punks!" Binh triumphant as always proceeded to go on the offensive, running towards the nearest police station... this being when his reality crumbled.


There they stood before him, suits.... hundreds upon thousands of them, no identity no face no reason. Controlled by the lizards themselves, he could see them clear as day he knew that it was time for the final fight, he would be the liberator of the world!


---Booting up systems---


---re-initializing retinal implants---


---establishing connection to the cybernet---


Receiving his pre programmed wake up shock Binh was brought back to reality.


"God this shit again... Where the fuck are we?" Binh groggily asked as he collected himself.


"Second hideout, the abandoned hospital. Get in contact with Greg will you?" G-man asked before getting back to sorting out all the stuff that had gone to shit.


"Sure dude, just gimme a sec." Procuring an upper to get his mental faculties back up to standards he was about to get a burner phone just when their own phone rang...it being obvious that it would have been Greg was obvious seeing as how that number was rather secret.


"Yo tiny waddup dude, we in da 6. when you gonna be creepin' man?"
 
Tossing the unconscious hacker over his shoulder had been easy, Gabe thought. It had been positioning the twerp on the front of his back-up bike - a piece of shit that belonged in a garage fifty years back but that wouldn't break even if you tried - stashed between his suited arms. He'd not even had time to throw a leather jacket over either of them so if they went skidding on the rough tarmac of Nevereign's street...well, road rash wouldn't be that hard to get covered up. It'd just hurt like a bastard. His breathing had been erratic as he revved the old machine, kicking up the stand and growling to himself as he gunned it out of the not-so-safehouse, their bug out bags across his back and the  rough handles of the bike beneath his tightly gripping fingers. This was not a good situation - it was one he had been prepared for, but being compromised for the first time in three years in Nevereign. Three years of killing, of breaking into corporate strongholds and stealing everything not nailed down that had some value, of burning his way through the rich and powerful - at their will or his own...


Gabriel shook his head as he took a hard left, almost bowling over a guy in a bulky helmet - probably a VR set that he'd loaded some shitty Augmented Reality program or a porno flick onto. Some people just liked their world a little brighter and with more tits. Even when his heart was racing and his eyes kept tracking across the streets, looking for corp sniper drones or cars full of tooled up enforcers coming for his head he had to laugh. It wasn't the usual calm chuckle, and if Bihn had been awake he'd probably have seen just how nervous his boss was - the cackle that issued from his corded throat was a desperate grasping thing reaching out for the cool, collected calm he usually exuded. The bike was chugging under him and Bihn's head lolled to the side as he made another turn, the light Korean almost slipping down the side and off onto the road before Gabe nudged him back. This one, he had to worry about - the Bloody Murder agents scattered all over the country? Not so much. They were safe, for now, if the hacker hadn't gotten through their encrypted channels. They all had disposable comlinks, like the sort he kept in his pocket - the one on his ear was a personal, but he'd paid good money to have it locked down. 


"Hey!" Pedestrians, they got so indignant when you nearly ran them down - though they promptly shut up when  you took a hand from the bars of your bike. There were plenty of shootings in this part of town.

He keyed it quickly, muttering his brother's name into the mic that reached down to his throat. That was a nice feature, let him subvocalise if he had to. "Oi, shithead!" It came out as a growl, almost shut out by the wind as he let the throttle out a little - sending his machine speeding up a straight street surprisingly clear of garbage for this part of the slums. The reply was near instant - Gregory, bored in tone and slow to talk, was animated as soon as he heard his brother's voice. Gabe could imagine him sitting in some office, shipping manifests scattered in front of him and a cup of soy-coffee perched precariously over the important documents. 
"What's up G?" 
That didn't bring a smile like it usually did, and Gabriel's voice showed it. "You remember the old tree? The one behind Auntie Mira's house? Hide under it." The code phrase was as old. It'd been their way of telling each other things had gone wrong ever since they'd been taken in by their surrogate mother. The link cut off, and Gabe muttered another name. The same phrase, several times over - the international calls he had to make putting a gentle dent into his bank account. At least the family would be safe, if things continued to go tits up around here. Though if they did that he knew very few things would keep them safe. 


It was another half hour of riding and nudging his hacker back into a sitting position before they arrived at the secondary safehouse. It was a run down dump of a place, a sterile old hospital with a basement that Greg thought was perfect. To get into the hole of a base here though, you had to walk through the old foyer, its white tiles stained in blood from an outbreak of some bio-weapon years ago. It'd gotten the place quarantined, then condemned. The weapon was gone, having only been around for a few years, but no one wanted to be treated in a place where a few hundred people had bled out every drop of blood in their bodies - everywhere. After that horror show, the climb down a set of stairs behind the reception desk to an old door was almost comforting. The anarchist parked his bike in an alley, relying on the local thugs to make it disappear, before grabbing Bihn and carefully stepping his way through the old place, the brown, flaking walls down well worn stone steps. It took a hefty boot to the jamb to get the damp swollen door at the bottom open and to close it behind him. The interior was a little nicer - the walls weren't painted with old blood at least, and the next door was a smoothly oiled metal job he'd put in himself - enough to give them a little time if some corporate hit-team wanted a go at them in their beds. It took all his strength to resist slamming it closed behind him once he stepped into the cool interior of the secondary safe house - moving to dump the bug out bags and his unconscious friend in a  corner while he pulled his gun from its holster and checked it over. The other doors in the room all led into other parts of the basement; some of it was flooded from where a watermain had burst years ago, but there were plenty of paths to run down or nooks and crannies to make a final stand in if it came to that. 


It was then that he heard a faint 'Zap' and his unconscious companion snapped back to consciousness. Turning to stare down at Bihn, he sighed softly - this was one of the two good friend he had around him and the little guy had almost fried today. Greg was off somewhere, probably resisting the urge to murder or find the fucker who'd done this to him and eviscerate him. The bastard had a violent streak a mile wide but Gabe still worried; he needed his team together. They needed to find the bastard and tear him a new one. "Awake are we, wee guy?" 
"God this shit again...Where the fuck are we?" The hacker sounded groggy, never a good sign. Not with Bihn. 
"The second hideout, the abandoned hospital. Get in Contact with Greg will you?" 


The hacker might have replied but Gabriel was too busy pulling his equipment from the heavy green duffel bag he'd dragged all the way from their last erstwhile home. First, the ballistic mask went over his face - blocking out all the other thoughts in his head or the emotions that might try to crawl onto his face. Next, the armoured vest and grieves, locking into tight intersecting plates over his shirt - he'd tossed his suit jacket into the corner. Keeping his holdout in his back holster, he pulled his heavy shoulder rig on, tucking his other pistol into the holster beneath his arm. Marceline, his knife, tucked into his belt - her sheathe staring up at him reproachfully with the four sets of inlaid initials gleaming in the dim light of the hideout's old bulbs. The rifle was last, the barrel locking and the magazine clicking loudly enough to fill him with satisfaction. Armed, he stood and stared towards the door. "Get me some info on the surrounding area Bihn. I want to know if I'm going to have to fight and die today too.
 
"Sure dude, right on, fucking hang up in my face cause that's the polite way to go about it." Binh irritatingly muttered while getting himself on his feet and hearing G-man's request.


"Sooooo, back to the cybernet I go now? Right into the hands of those SHIFTY ANNUNAKI WORSHIPING STALKERS YOU SAY!?!?" Silence followed, a minute later Binh appearing to have made a realization, or maybe the drugs returned him to his usual state of mind continued "Sure dude, why not, you just need some info about the district right?" Binh having received his orders from his rather, irritated looking boss, got to work.


Binh led a simple life in all honesty, hacking was an over exaggerated thing and in this day and age it had reached about the simplest it could ever be, most of it nowadays came down to brute force password cracking or using corrupted software to gain access into databases.


Today's job was one even more banal then that, it essentially came down to browsing a 3d map and just looking up any points of interest.


A police precinct in the pocket of ronin... a number of supermarkets under corporate ownership, those being the location where most people found their barely paid employment... "Oh... now what do we got here." Binh started speaking to himself, he often dropped his tough N hard way of speaking when he was on the cybernet and surprisingly enough it was more often then not one of the more pleasant times to speak to him.


Something interesting did present itself though, a European based shipping conglomerate had a warehouse here for transferring goods brought from sea to the rail. That warehouse appeared to be the base of operations of a Yak group from the looks of it too, probably as a way of easily shipping illegal goods.


"I got your shit G, aside from your usual street-punks and cops for hire there is one potentially dangerous target around here." He wanted to continue speaking, but he was interrupted by an incoming call from anonymous though


"The wild child is coming home to the silver mountain." Tiny spoke that one sentence, clearly excitable. 


"The house of the rising sun is waiting for you young boy." Hoping he could cheer up a seemingly heated scrapper through the use of some classic lyrics he always had to go way back to find something tiny liked though, a true man of the yesteryear."


After hanging up he turned to G-man once more "Tiny's coming back, he sounds rather touchy to me... anyways! Dude yeah I found something, there appears to be a Yak group operating around the place with the aid of some fancy pants european corp. I got this fire idea on how to fuck shit over dude, you'd never believe it." Binh had plans, but he was not the leader and even knowing that he was a genius, a truly avant garde innovator. G-man knew best, he always did, the man had outplayed Binh many a time and he had learned to not act without his leaders permission.
 
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"We wait for Greg." Gabriel grunted at his overly excitable hacker, checking his gun for the fourth time since they'd arrived. For just a split second, a small part of his brain had wanted to shoot the hacker - his little outbursts about conspiritard bullshit always brought that urge down on his shoulders. The mask over his face hid everything though and he was glad of that; he'd rather not set Bihn's paranoia off with a murderous look or an angry glance. The little guy was twitchy enough after relocating and he'd have to have his wits about him if things were going sour as Gabe's guts told him they were. The leader of Bloody Murder had a strange amount of trust in his gut - it'd saved him from losing his head more than once, or getting blown away by corp-sec goons. Strangely enough he'd not had a bad feeling since they'd gotten to the hospital; all the way there his stomach had been twisting but now, without an attack forthcoming or a corporate deathsquad kicking down his door to blow his brains out and burn the remains he was strangely calm. 

Bihn rattled off something at him and he came out of his thoughts, glancing up at the Korean. "I want to know what the big bastard's been up to before we hit any Yaks.". 
 
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Greg made good time on the way to the hospital, with the hacker dead he didn't need to worry about anyone tracking him so no need for a long or roundabout path there, blatantly violating every speed ordinance in the city may have also played a part in that.


Still basking in sadistic afterglow Greg parked the stolen car, grabbed his bags and, whistling the chorus to some long forgotten 2010s punk song, made his way to the basement. A loud, metallic clang resounded out as he knocked on the security door, "Open up Boss," He shouted, sounding almost giddy, almost, "I got intel."
 
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It took a lot of will for Gabe to not fill the metal door with rounds. He knew for a fact that it would stop them but as the heavy handed knocking startled him out of his reverie and his gun came up it took all of his will and skill to not squeeze the trigger and the only person audacious enough to come knocking at his security door like that would be Greg. The cell leader relaxed as he heard the psychotic cybercommando yell through the door, suspicion confirmed, before making his way to the heavy steel slab and drawing it open on its well oiled hinges. "You motherfucker, near scared me half to death." It came out almost as a growl from behind the mask, which hid wild eyes and a manic grin - Gabriel was still ready for a fight, but he was happy to have his comrade in anarchy back. "The fuck you so happy about?" 
 
With uncharacteristic speed, meaning only a third of a second delay instead of a half second one, Greg responded, "I got him Boss." he said as he entered the safehouse proper, grinning like the lunatic he was. "Stupid bastard was just some delusional freelancer," Greg was practically giggling as he dumped the contents of his bugout kits on the floor, kneeling down to sort through the various boxes of ammunition, loose grenades, beer cans, cigarette packs and other gear. "Walked right up to me and started yammering, I broke his spine like a fucking twig."


Greg suddenly looked up, locking his metal eyes on his short Korean comrade, "Oh man, Binh, you gotta pull the footage from my headcam, you guys have to see me paste him. It's amazing." Greg stopped suddenly, seemingly coming down a bit, when he spoke again his voice was lower, flatter in tone. "Oh, wait, we'll need to wait to do that, or we'll miss our chance."


"Chance for what?" Gabe asked.


"Before I geeked the hacker he told me about some shit going down at Ronin, apparently them and Bullwark were doing some meeting and Lazarus decided to crash it and try to frame Mos, supposed to be a bunch of high-level execs on site. I figure we might as well hit the place anyway, with most of our gear gone we won't get a better chance to loot dead Corp-Sec goons than this." The giant shrugged, "If we hurry we can probably swoop in and finish the lot of them off right now."
 
Gabriel laughed, it was a deep, rumbling laugh at a joke that didn't exist, the laugh of a madman. "Fookin Christ Greg." It took a moment for the laughter to subside before the proverbial mask joined the one he was actually wearing. "Let's get a move on then. Binh, get hacking, we're gonna need to play this one smarter than usual, I want camera feeds, enemy comms, the works."

"Yo, no prob G-man, fuckin shifter puppet corpers won't know what hit em." Binh shot back.

"I'll drive." Greg deadpanned, a small, twisted smile creeping at the corners of his mouth, this night just kept getting better and better.
 


Preparations took mere minutes, Binh wiped the Sedan of its digital signature, effectively erasing it from existence as Greg and Gabe piled weapons, ammo and two slightly worse for wear drones into it. The pair of demented thugs racing into the night at high speed as the even more demented thug jumped into cyberspace.
 

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