The next morning we both got busy and didn't really speak to each other- rather, I got busy while he slept in. For a guy without even a proper home and being tied up, he slept deeply.

'Course, he awoke when I hit him in the face with his bag of stuff, but otherwise would've probably kept sleeping. I could appreciate his relaxed approach. And it made me significantly less nervous of him doing something in the night. I'd still keep my guard up just in case this was all part of a long-con.

What I couldn't appreciate was someone who constantly shifts and speaks in their sleep. I'm not a heavy sleeper by necessity. Even though he was tied up in the living room all night, every time he would talk and move about in his sleep it'd wake me up. It was seriously annoying. Heck, the first time it happened I almost shot him because I forgot he was even there. The last time I almost shot him to end my suffering.

Although I was lacking sleep, I wasn't idle. The first thing I did was sneak up and grab the guy's phone. Hidden Hands, Lethargic Presence, and Stalk helped me out, though it was probably overkill. He was lasered in on sleeping, so he didn't even notice as I snuck back to my deck, uploaded the Alpha-Tres Rootkit to his phone, turned on tracking software, and slipped it back into place as if nothing happened. Just a bit of insurance, nothing more.

I also took the time to go down and chat with my landlord. As it turned out, Feras had, in fact, been living here before I rented the place. Nice to know he wasn't lying to me since day one, though that still wasn't enough to make me trust him fully. It did lower my suspicions of it all being an eidolonic setup though. It was purely coincidental... probably.

After that, I pulled my hair into a ponytail and started to work on the device. I needed to finish it up, and soon. I was just having issues with the ADF receiver connecting to the antenna. It wasn't as simple as setting a frequency and letting it go. As soon as it connected, the hydraulic would start moving at random, and I had no idea why it was happening. After several hours, I could confidently say it was a software issue and not a hardware one, which ws just perfect.

Hours passed by as I swapped between surfing the Net for ideas, trying to do it myself, and taking breaks to rehash my plans. I also took the time to look over the blueprint of Ajay Insurance's building. I memorized it at first glance, of course. Still, it helped to just look at something. It gave my mind more space to analyze and work through alternative plans in case my current one went bottoms up.

I was starting to get frustrated when I decided to take a break. I set down my deck, hopped off the counter, and threw some water into a prepack. After a few seconds, the heating element inside the prepack reacted with the water, and the ramen instantly heated up to a nice eating temperature. It was sooooo much nicer than eating cold and dry silage.

Just as I was about to start eating, Feras peaked his head in with a cute fox sprite wrapped around his shoulder. It hadn't materialized yet, so I ignored its presence as its fluffy fur swayed in a nonexistent wind. Ugh- he couldn't keep ambushing me like this.

"Uh- hey, c-can I borrow one? I'll pay you back!" He was back to acting out the innocent and cowardly boy.

I sighed and lowered the fork with a bite of somewhat delicious food on it. At least his presence wasn't entirely a bother thanks to his sprite. "Just how are you going to pay me? You have a grift planned? And when?"

"I'm getting back in touch with my c-contacts for a gig… It's been a month, so some of them are understandably weary about c-contacting me back…" He rubbed the back of his head, nearly hitting the fox, and a fragment of drained Aythryn citizen peeked through his timid boy act. Still couldn't tell if it was a facade.

I stared at him for a time, swirling my steaming prepack. "What happened to you? Anything that'll blow onto me by proxy?"

"No!" He immediately shot me down. "Y-you don't have to worry about that. It's been taken care of…"

"Then at least tell me the story of the blood stain in my bedroom." I reached into the counter and pulled out another prepack, waving it around like a treat.

His eyes snapped to it. "I um… to tell the truth, about a month ago, a couple slags broke in and beat me up. The blood is where I half bled out."

Note to self: get better locks on the door- who was I kidding? If someone wanted to break in, a little lock wouldn't do anything. It was incredibly easy to lockpick such a thing, and even the dial ones weren't safe. I knew from a lot of personal experience in B&E just how easy it was to get through them.

I'd have to splurge and get a high-end system if I wanted true protection… but then my apartment would be marked. Strong security meant something worth protecting. True protection came in either looking too poor to be worth the effort, or having far too much protection to be worth the effort. Still, as evidenced by the growing merc field, strong protection wasn't even all that good anymore.

I tossed him the pack. "Then you also need to buy the cleaners to scrub out the blood when you get more money."

He looked at me like I was a monster as he turned up his innocent boy act to the max. Even the fox looked at me oddly. "Um… o-okay… I need to go in a bit to get the a-actual clothing for the uniform. You're kinda short, so-"

"I'm perfectly normal! I just- just haven't hit my growth spurt yet!" I kicked his shin as hard as I could.

I slouched down against the counter. Any day now it would come. My diet was even better, so surely I'll gain some height… at least an inch? Please? I'll take a few inches over a Skill Point if one of you wants to offer me one! Could the eidolons even hear my thoughts? Or was it more of a vocalization thing?

Feras flinched back and rubbed at his shin. "Riighhht… A-anyway, I'm assuming we don't have money?"

"Not yet." My mind shifted from my height to a less depressing topic. The only thing worse than realizing you were broke was a broke calling you out on it…

The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.

He backed up with the prepack. "Yeah. I'll, ahem, acquire the clothes then. Enjoy your meal."

I did, indeed, enjoy my meal. During that time, I surfed around the Net and checked out guides on how to do stuff regarding hand-to-hand combat. It'd be a nice Skill to have at least my toes dipped in. I was better off getting trained by Uncle Ezra or Mira, but it at least got me used to seeing the motions. After that, I quickly returned to work.

After a few hours, in which Feras returned at some point, I finally had a breakthrough. I found it on ancient site that looked pre K-10. Apparently, the reason my setup failed was thanks to ambient interference scrambling the signals. It didn't offer a solution, but at least I had a potential cause for my problems.

Shortly after some focused research, I found a solution; frequency hopping. It was something first used way back during one of the old world wars. Basically, the carrier frequency for my signal would rapidly switch between a wide band of frequencies in a preset pattern and act like a password. This way only my commands would reach the receiver and the ambient interference wouldn't bother it.

The issue arose thanks to the fact most remote systems had frequency hopping built into them for ease of access since ADF naturally had a lot of ambient disturbances. I'd bought cheap though, and cheap shot me in the foot. Funny how that works.

It took a while to set it up, especially considering I was using copy-pasted spaghetti code I barely understood the function of. After a long time of trial and error, I sent a test through. I excitedly watched the hinge push with its cylinder and the firing pin tightly tapped against the table.

I nearly shouted with joy and played around with the now working tech. An intense surge of satisfaction coursed through me thanks to my newest toy. Sure, it wasn't elegant and there were definitely better things out there, but I made it myself. It was incomparable in my heart.

The little guy was just missing a single thing: a name. I played with it for a while and tried to figure out what to call it. At long last, something came to mind. I watched the firing pin hit the table repeatedly. Yeah, let's call it Tapper.

With all that figured out, I redrew the schematic in my journal and hammered in the details and labels. I spent the rest of the night making two more tappers just in case.

Feras stopped me just before I hit the sack. He was holding the uniform, which looked stunningly similar to a real one. The patchwork specifically of the company logo looked incredible. The guy had some talent at making clothes if nothing else.

"It's not done yet." Feras said as he handed it to me with a drained expression.

I arched an eyebrow at him and looked it over. Looked fine to me. "What's missing?"

He wearily pulled out his phone and showed me a picture of an Artoras employee. "The badge. I don't have the resources to make one."

"Okay… what would you need?"

"A lot of things. It'll be a couple hundred Rayn to get everything back to make this kind of stuff flawlessly." He zoomed in on the badge. "Corps use IRF-coded badges to prove they're real. I can't replicate that without some specialized equipment."

This was news to me… what were the chances he's lying to me? Hmm… not very high. It did sound like something a paranoid corpo would make to stop the very thing I was trying to do. Especially if it was an IT or security corporation. "I'm as broke as you… Can I run without it?"

"No. Did you see that box behind the receptionist's desk?" He took his phone back and scrolled through his photo reel.

"Chek."

He stopped on an image and showed it to me. It was a similar-looking device. "It's not exact, but close enough. Chances are high it's an IRF reader… the fact they have one in the first place is weird. That kind of tech isn't in the basic package. Most likely, they're paying for Artoras's high-end package."

I frowned and leaned up against the wall of my apartment. Part of me wanted to stay suspicious about this IRF coding, but he would know better about this kind of thing since his job is going in the front. If only I was more confident in my sneaking Skills... "Is there a workaround?"

"How good are you at pickpocketing?"

— — —

The next morning, after kicking Feras out to take a shower, I drove as close as I could to Artoras's headquarters on the northernmost edge of Old Town. The building was sandwiched between the 'historic' buildings of Old Town and the newer ones of Downtown.

Feras had stayed behind to sleep in once I let him back into the apartment. I was weary about leaving him behind in the apartment by himself, but the Rootkit and tracking software in his phone gave me a small amount of confidence. I checked the Mapp™ in my hud and saw him still at my apartment building. He hadn't moved even an inch.

I already had on the uniform of the group. It was essentially a custom white button-up shirt and slacks. The symbol of the corporation was sewn onto the slacks and shirt. The corp thankfully didn't seem to be too strict on extras. Several of the pictures showed them wearing hats, jackets, blazers, and other assorted 'extra' pieces.

I pulled my baseball hat, go Aythryn City Slashers, from my saddlebag and put it on. I also snagged a small lighter and a half-empty box of cigarettes I kept for a rainy day. Then I followed along with foot traffic to Artoras's massive glass front entry and checked it out.

The place was designed like a massive U with arms of balconies and offices surrounding a drop to the lobby. 'Course I already knew that thanks to Eidetic Schematic and the city's directory, but it was good to get an actual visual.

A gaggle entered the building, mostly splitting into two. What looked to be employees headed toward the interior of the building blocked by armed security, metal detectors, and card readers. The other group, clients probably, headed to a reception area.

I could sneak in the front, but it wasn't exactly my style. Instead, I headed to a side alley of the building to follow a tried and true method of mine. The roads in the alley were far more worn out than the main ones, and little pools of water filled potholes all over the place.

I kept my head low to block my face from any cameras around. I casually toyed with the lighter while walking around back, flicking it on and off. The back exit had a small piece of asphalt place by it. Perfect.

This area wasn't exclusive to the pools of water building up. Floating in said pools were little cigarette buds. Most were random brands of synth-tobacco cigarettes, each promising to be better than the last while probably bringing increasingly dangerous effects. Heck, there were even quite a few Tosta ones.

One kind in particular stood out. It was red and black instead of the usual brown and white. Printed on the paper was a laughing skull wearing a jester's hat. The Neo-Jokers. Someone around here appreciated real tobacco even if it was pricey.

Seeing as no one was out here, I pulled a cigarette out and cut off a quarter. Then I lit it up and casually stood around. The area was obviously where several smokers came, and probably a camera dead zone to boot. No way they went somewhere where they could be recorded smoking instead of working.

I hung outside for several minutes, waiting patiently with my nose wrinkled. Cigarettes stunk, and there wasn't any other way of putting it. After a period of time, the door creaked open and a man poked his head out. Immediately, the cigarette flicked from my hand to a puddle and I put on a 'guilty' expression.

The man wore a rather fancy suit. Exec, maybe? He chuckled and propped the door with the chunk before heading out with a cigarette of his own. It was one of the fancy Neo-Joker ones. "You new here, kid?"

"Y-yes sir." I stammered and put on a worried look. I may not be a grifter, but this level of acting was rather easy.

"Got a light?" He held the cigarette out to me.

I fumbled for the lighter thanks to my 'nerves', and pulled it out. I held it aloft and lit the guy's cigarette. He nodded to me and took a long drag of his cigarette, letting out a breath full of smoke. I edged around him and headed for the door-

"Hey, kid!" The guy called out to me.

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