I looked around at the damage I wrought. Honestly? It went way better than expected. Hidden Hands, Hidden Weapons, and Throwing Weapon Master were truly a perfect combo. Add in Ambidextrous, and I could perfectly throw daggers without anyone the wiser. It was a seriously lethal combination.

I pushed aside the guy who forced me to the ground. He easily collapsed, frothing at the mouth as his arms continued to bend and break. He was beyond the point of screams now, his nerves shattered and destroyed. Blood constantly leaked from where his shoulders attached to the chrome.

I aimed my pistol and pulled the trigger, putting the Circle cultist out of his misery. He collapsed back, though the chrome continued to wiggle and whirl like a snake in its death throes. When I removed the internal limiter, I figured something like this would happen.

The other four were also down and out. One of them, the second in line who ate half the grenade, still stubbornly clung to life. His jaw had blown off, though, and his face was covered in metal frags. Even if he survived, his life would not be an easy one.

I likewise put a bullet in him, leaving me as the only living person on the staircase. I stared at the five for a moment before I moved around to start looting. Usually, I'd feel some kind of guilt or something for killing people, but the Circle had miraculously gotten rid of that feeling. If they saw people as nothing more than fertilizer, then why should I see these barbarians as human?

The loot was nice. I dropped most of my flashes and loaded up on grenades. Between the five of them, there were eight grenades, fully restocking my supplies. I also swiped all their knives. I was going to grab their pistols, too, but they were bio-locked.

I grabbed one of the gel rifles, Technical Expertise sending a pulse through it. In mere moments, every part and mechanism of the weapon created a mental blueprint for me to look through. Usually, instantly memorizing a blueprint with Eidetic Schematic didn't mean instantly knowing how it worked. The gel rifles were simple though.

Using my foot, I tapped one of the dead guy's heads. A pulse went through it, creating a mental blueprint of the helmets they wore. Integrated HUD, auto-darkening, integrated comms… not exactly a cheap piece of equipment. Sentinel tech at that. In fact, all their gear was Sentinel tech.

Were Sentinel and the Circle… together? It was an unsettling realization. One I hoped was false. If one of the Big 7 were backing the Circle, they were far more dangerous than I thought they were.

It wasn't without evidence either. The Circle and Sentinel had been closely entwined ever since I stumbled across them. And they had Sentinel equipment… Regardless, there was at least someone in a very high position of Sentinel working with the Circle.

I pulled a helmet off the corpse, taking a look at it from their perspective. A map sat up at the top, filled in with an array of green triangles moving around in real-time. A quick count revealed fifty-five of them. A red dot stood exactly where I was, seemingly updating about every thirty seconds or so.

"Squad ten, check in." A woman's voice came across the line. It sounded slightly digitized. The runner, maybe?

No one replied. Was this group squad ten? I deepened my voice, trying to match the gruff tone of the guy I'd heard when I watched from the top of the stairs. "Roger, Overwatch. It was just a drunk. We're moving."

It wasn't perfect, but it would probably fool the runner. They were more into tech than people anyway. Especially with around sixty voices to remember. My voice imitation wasn't terrible, which helped.

"Affirmative. Scans indicate the target is close. Be ready." The woman replied.

I let out a sigh of relief as my gamble paid off. "Roger, Overwatch. Hear that squad? Guns up!"

I dropped the helmet off to the side, alongside the gel rifle. It was bio-locked anyway, and there was no telling if it had some kind of tracker built into it. Unfortunate, but what can I say? This group was super prepared.

The helmet was a temptation to track the Circle's cultists, but it was a double-edged sword. It wouldn't take long to realize I had it, then it would provide even more accurate tracking of my position. Not to mention the Netrunner might just blow it up while I was still wearing it.

I walked down the stairs, nearly slipping in a pool of blood as I hit the next landing. From this squad's visor, I picked up quite a few details. There were only two other squads in this building. One set looked like they were in the elevator, and the other led to the lobby. The rest were closing in, but I'd made quite a big gap.

I moved swiftly, darting out onto the second floor and to the elevator panel. I tore it off, messing with the internals for a minute. Eventually, I hit my goal as the entire panel short-circuited. The elevator's floor indicator flashed a few times before going dark.

Hopefully, that'd stall at least one more group-

"Yo man, -hic- you one of those Edgerunners?" A guy called out to me from behind. I whipped around, pistol up and ready-

Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.

I dropped my gun, eying the drunk as a new plan started to form. Looked like a corporate executive who drank a bit too much. He was handsome, but I spotted a few signs it wasn't his natural face. Low-end bio-mods. Probably a bottom to mid-tier corpo. Young too. Maybe nepotism? "What's it to you?"

"Wicked, dude. I -hic- always wanted to…" He stopped mid-sentence, his eyes glazing over slightly. "Yo, nova, dog. You're, like, soaked -hic- in blood."

Normally, I'd ignore him. I was in a tiny bit of a rush. It just so happened I needed a distraction though. The basement had its own staircase, and I'd need to go out across the lobby to reach it.

"Know what'd be even more nova?" I asked the guy.

"What?" He drunkenly staggered to me, dropping his bottle onto the ground. It shattered. "Damn it."

"Assisting an Edgerunner in the middle of a gig. Just think about the legendary tale you could spin at work." I tried to sugar him up, offering a promise of escaping the mundane. That's what most corp execs wanted anyway. If he refused, I could figure something else out. But a bit of assistance would go a long way.

"Hmm…" His face sobered up a bit. "Dangerous?"

I shook my head. "Not at all."

"Fine… but give me your -hic- number." The guy swaggered over.

"Terrible place for pickup lines." And I'm, like, ten years younger than this guy. Pedo.

"Wha-?" A look of confusion crossed his face. "No, no. My board -hic- wanted to hire one. This makes it easier -hic-."

More business after all this was over, eh? I thought about it for a few moments, rattling off the number of one of my burner phones that was back at my speakeasy. He wrote it down on his hand with a pen. The drunk would probably wipe it all off before the night was over anyway.

I shared the plan with him and then went back down to the stairs. He staggered out in front of me, pausing to glance at me before heading to the middle of the lobby. I peeked through a crack in the door, spotting the squad guarding the place.

They were set up at the entrance, checking everyone who passed by. They likewise kept an eye on the staircase. The squad no longer had a photo; instead checking the clothing of every person.

The manager at the counter looked pissed as the guard continued to drop the mood of the place, though she didn't do anything. No telling which corpo sent them. Not everyone was as brave or as stupid to backtalk strike squads like that bar owner had been.

My distraction waltzed up to the middle of them before shouting at the top of his voice, "Grenade!"

Immediately, the training infused into the squad kicked in. They ducked out of the way, jumping behind cover. I took the opportunity to dart from the door to the maintenance hall across the lobby as their vigilance dropped. Burst Step raised my speed by several notches as I practically flew.

A combination of my Perks and using the crowd as cover proved to be perfect as I got across the space in quick order. It didn't seem like anyone noticed me, of the squads that is. There were definitely quite a few bar patrons who were surprised by my passing.

Just as I entered the basement stairs, I heard my brave sacrifice shouting, "Do you even know who I am? Unhand me-"

I had about twenty seconds until they caught on, and I didn't waste it. This place was some kind of karaoke bar, I think. The bottom floor was full of alcohol, a laundry room, and a dozen other amenities. It was quite expansive, reaching out further than the building itself in what I'm sure was illegal construction. I moved past most of them, opening a supply closet on the far side of the basement.

I took the grenades out, rigging together an explosive. I pulled the pin, tossing the bundle of four into the room against the back wall. It wedged in between a rack and the back wall.

I hid for a few seconds-

Boom!

I moved quickly, checking the supply closet. The back wall had collapsed, revealing the basement of the building across the street. I moved as fast as I could, entering it and then heading up to the first floor. It was some kind of apartment building with the first floor acting as a bodega.

I climbed to the roof as my mental count hit thirty, checking over my shoulder as I spotted the squads starting to move on my location already. Not that it mattered. With my height advantage, I easily took the chance to leap from it to the next one over. They'd have to go all the way around the block to catch up.

I mixed up my direction, seemingly running north as my count hit thirty once more. Then I doubled back, heading southeastish. It was a bit out of the way of my intended intermediary goal—Ryu Container Yard—but it was fine. I had a plan.

I'd made a gap, but it wouldn't last for long. I was on foot, and these guys had access to dozens of vans as transportation. Without any workarounds, it was only a matter of time till I was caught.

I was fast approaching my next plan though. I looked around, spotting the black vans caught in traffic a couple blocks back. And the time was… I looked up at my HUD. Perfect. I was worried I'd be delayed too much by my stop at the karaoke bar, but this was going exactly as I planned.

I moved for a set of mostly free-standing stairs in the middle of the sidewalk, climbing up them as I raced for the sky tram suspended above the city streets. The rain cut off as I entered underneath the stairs cover. A few homeless lay on the stairs, though no one bothered me as I went up. Thirty. Another pulse went off.

I arrived at the top of the platform just as the sky tram's doors started to close. I used Burst Step to clear the distance instantaneously, tumbling into the upside-down train as my legs throbbed in pain. I had maybe one or two more uses of Burst Step till my legs gave out.

The doors shut behind me, leaving me to finally have a moment to catch my breath as the sky tram smoothly started to glide across its rails. Plan C successfully initiated. Hopefully, I'll be able to get a bit more distance this time around. Surely the city's infrastructure was harder to hack than a random box truck's… right?

I looked out over the storming city, spotting the relative darkness of the Ryu Container Yard through the gaps between neon buildings. It's funny, at some point, I wanted nothing more than to escape that place. Now I wanted nothing more than to get to it quicker.

The rain flashed with neon as it continued to fall, lulling me into a momentary calm as I waited for my next glance at the dim container yard in the middle of the city. I had full confidence to get through there once I reached it. Reaching it was the issue though.

I sat down in one of the seats, finally taking in the insides. Quite a few city-dwellers watched me with interest. I flicked on Fear the Reaper. "Curiosity killed the cat."

They ducked, hiding from my gaze as they pretended to get on their phones or do something else. If nothing else, the people of this city were well-trained to ignore what didn't involve them. That training kicked in as the eyes on me vanished.

Leaning back, I took a few deep breaths as my mind whirled into action once more and plans started to form. Just a bit further now.

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