I froze, making several quick judgements. Eventually, my rationality won out over my fight-or-flight instinct and I turned back. "Sir?"

"Next time, don't put it out so fast? I won't tell if you won't." He smiled and took a long drag of his cigarette.

"Thank you, sir." I dipped my head and entered the building. This would be a one and done type of deal if I had my way.

Infiltration successful. Getting in was almost pitifully easy amongst medium corporations. They toed the line of easily infiltratable security and being so small everyone knew everyone. Such a thing definitely wouldn't have worked at Ajay's where the guy probably knew all of his workers. Or maybe it would have considering how vain he seemed?

It definitely wouldn't have worked at somewhere like Mystech or Raijin where their security had security. Most assuredly not Sentinel. The place was practically para-military. Maybe Medtech? They were essentially a massive hospital, so it wouldn't be impossible… yeah, out of all the Big 7, Medtech would definitely be the easiest. Not that I was suicidal enough to ever target one of the Big 7.

Anyway, I was in. Now came the complicated step of finding the right ID. I talked to Feras about it this morning before he went back to sleep, and there was a high likelihood the IRF scanner at Ajay's was linked to the Artoras employee database. I needed someone who looked similar to me, at least enough so as not to raise any suspicion when I showed up with their ID.

I slipped out of my jacket, covering my chest with it to hide the fact I had no apparent ID. After that, I walked around the hallways, keeping my head down to avoid cameras and casually passing by groups. I kept up a calm, casual walk that looked as if I knew where I was going.

I passed by a lonesome man, sneaking up behind him. Lethargic Presence came out at full blast. I waited for a moment. The guy broke out into a big yawn, hiding me from view. I struck like lighting with Hidden Hands, snatching his badge. I clipped it to my shirt as a temporary measure.

Thankfully, they weren't the kinds of IDs with photos. Just names, department codes, and a few other pieces of information. And just like that, I looked just like any other Artoras Employee.

Now came the difficult part, finding the right person. With the new badge, I became a lot more confident and took the stairs up to the second floor's offices. I held the same dead smile most of them forced. No one stopped me or tried to talk to me; everyone was too busy living their own lives to care about little ole' me.

After turning down a few halls and following the directions of several signs, I arrived at the cubicle farm where dozens of employees worked. I checked the nearby placard on the wall; External IT Department.

I paused at the entrance, sweeping through the cubicles. I knew there were a few good targets, so I just needed to find them. A guard headed toward me, jumpstarting my movement. I headed into the cubicle farm toward the back

I checked around until I found someone that looked kind of like me. If I actually ate well, was taller, older, and uglie- less pretty. If asked, I could probably play it off as going to a sculptor.

I 'tripped' into her cubicle, hitting the ground just in front of her with a light thunk. I bounced a bit further into her cubicle, making myself quite obvious and attention grabbing.

The woman bolted out of her chair like a pack of Dune Walkers was after her. Then her brain kicked into gear and she offered me a hand with the same dead smile most corporate drones had. "Oh dear! Are you alright?"

I may not be around corpos much, but I could read between the lines. By her stilted words and aggravated smile, she really meant 'get out'. I took her offered hand, leaning on her. She didn't even notice me swap our badges. "T-thank you! Sorry for the trouble."

I left the cubicle farm and headed back for the stairs. Mission accomplished, just like that. Corporate drones just made for far too easy marks. They were like sheep all gathered into a pasture for me, the wolf, to consume to my heart's content. 'Course, breaking into anything important here would be incredibly difficult with the shepherds- I mean, security, but simply snatching an ID? Child's play.

Getting out of the building with my loot was even easier. For the most part, the security was here to keep people out, not in. I easily slid past the guards and exited out the front door, all while keeping my face obscured by my hat. Too easy.

I got back to my bike and started the drive back north. As I went, called up Feras. Like a slag, I forgot my bag…

"Hello? Who's this?" His voice came across

Right… I forgot to give him my number. I just copied his down into my phone. "It's me."

He yawned loudly. Was he seriously just waking up? "Ah yes… you… you still haven't given me your name. You know that, right?"

"Are we on a name basis?" I switched lanes and passed a particularly slow truck.

"We're practically living together, so yeah?"

I growled into my phone. "Way to make it sound weird. Fine. Zuku."

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Note to self, I was very bad at making names up on the spot. I literally just took the first part of my last name, Tsukuyomi, and changed it a bit. Was that even something I could work on?

"Hmm…"

"What's the issue now?"

The sound of a faucet turning on came across. "You just don't seem like a Zuku… whatever. To what do I have the pleasure of your call, Miss Zuku?"

"You want more Rayn?"

"Always." His reply came quickly, nearly cutting me off.

About as I expected. Broke people would be broke. "I'll up your pay. Grab my bag and meet me at Ajay's. I want you to do overwatch."

The decision to have him watch over the area while I did my thing was entirely impulsive. I didn't want to pay him just for grabbing my bag. To be fair, having an overwatch was never a bad idea necessarily. Who knows, it could save me- No! Don't jinx yourself, Shiro!

"Sure. Which bag-"

Another call came across, this time from Nael. I immediately hung up on Feras and answered. "Hello?"

"Hey, kid." His voice held the usual smooth warmth it usually did. "How you holding up? Been a while since you checked in."

I laughed lightly. "You know me… just living the dream. I got a new apartment, and I've been running all over the city for work."

"Nova! I know you've been wanting to move out for a while. It's good you're getting out from under the Fang." He paused for a moment, as if unsure of how to approach the conversation. "It's almost been a month since I installed the Phantom. How's it been treating you?"

I dodged a car barrelling down the road. A second later I stopped entirely and a Crusade Cruiser blitzed by me with its siren on. "Alright. It's got a few issues, but nothing too bad."

Other than almost melting my brain out of my skull. A minor defect, all things considered. Blackout was super useful though. Dropping completely off any camera with a press of a button couldn't be underestimated.

"Preem stuff, eh? It's about time for you to head to Advent. Do you want to come with me? I'm headed there anyway to catch up with my friend." His voice got slightly quieter. "I'll be with you in a moment."

Good 'ole Nael… he must think I'll be nervous about heading to a corpo lab. I'd be fine though. I was a big girl. Thankfully, it was only a corporate lab and not a hellish Savant lab. I hope I never have to stumble across one of those. "I appreciate the offer, but you don't have to."

He typed away on something in the background. "Alright. If you change your mind, just let me know."

"Thank you. I'm in the middle of something, but I'll head over in a couple days."

My phone buzzed lightly against the side of my head. "I sent you Advent's location. Just ask for Doctor Fodisa and tell him I sent you. Good luck, kid."

"Cya."

I enjoyed the rest of my drive back out to Ajay's Insurance. It startled to drizzle lightly, taking some of the stifling heat out of the air. I parked and headed out into the crowd, skimming a few pockets while I waited.

Feras arrived a couple minutes later. He spotted me through the crowd and made his way over to me, bag on his shoulder. "I-I had a hard time deciding between the three bags in the apartment…"

"Well you grabbed the right one…" I pulled him aside and set up our comms once more. "Post up somewhere nearby."

"Right." He headed towards the Neo-sea food place we were at the last time. Did he have some Rayn on his own now? Talk some sugarmommy—or daddy—into giving him some pay?

I shook my head and entered an alley. A few street rats made to surround me, though were scared off when I waved my sidewinder. I went down the alleys a bit further until I found what I was looking for. A manhole cover sat in the middle of the alley.

I carefully pried the manhole cover out of the way. Once it was moved, I slid down into the tunnel system. It was old, but not nearly as ancient as the Underground. The area was relatively newer, at least forty or so years compared to the centuries-old stuff buried beneath the surface.

Still, it was cold, damp, and reeked quite heavily. The access tunnels were super cramped with pipes of various kinds running this way and that. There were even several areas where it looked like homeless people shacked up at one point, but they'd either long since died or left.

For a normal person, there was barely enough room to squeeze through the passage ways. I walked through mostly fine… chek, that stung my fragile ego…

I pulled the blueprint of the tunnel system into the forefront of my mind's eye and headed for the utility access point for the building. A locked door blocked my way forward. I pulled out a lockpick set from my bag. It'd been a long time, old friend. My skills were finally coming out to play.

It was rather easy to get into, though I didn't immediately head down the right tunnel. I stopped just at the entrance and took a deep breath. According to the blueprint, there was a camera watching over the entry to the utilities. It looked like a newer placement, probably to help prevent crime.

I released the breath and activated Blackout, completely ignoring the fact I told Mira I wouldn't use it again. It was just too useful, especially for times like this. I exploded into action, racing down the tunnel.

The camera over the door, far newer than the surroundings, couldn't see me. I darted below it, skidding to a stop in front of a barred door. I immediately crouched down and fiddled with the tumblers using the lockpick set.

Before my chrome eye could even heat to an uncomfortable level, I unlocked the door and entered the small utility room. Once inside and out of the camera's line of sight, I shut off Blackout.

The camera was new, yes, but it had a fixed arc, so I didn't have to worry about being spotted here. It was more of a keep honest people honest type of deal, just like locks. They worked but acted like a paper wall for anyone who actually wanted to get by them. Heck, the camera probably didn't even have good ICE protecting it. A Netrunner would be able to get in even easier than I did.

I thought about the blueprint again and slowly whittled down the various switches, pipes, valves, and panels. First I narrowed it down to Ajay's building, then the suit, and finally to the Node access port. The actual access port itself was covered in a mesh and locked with a key, but the wires coming out of it weren't.

I immediately set to work isolating the line and then pulled a tapper from my bag. It was a bit annoying, but I managed to use to drill the small device into the wall just next to the line so that the firing pin sat right over the access wire. Preem.

The tapper should hit the wire, not stopping the flow of access entirely, but interrupting it with each tap. For those using the Net, it'd probably seem like random drops in quality. I threw everything back into my bag, pulled out my deck, and made sure everything was set up.

"Feras, go check Ajay's Net connection." I finally called in my Overwatch.

After a minute, he came back across the comms. "I'm here. What am I looking for?"

I activated the tapper, letting it slam into the wires like a madman with a jackhammer. "Any drops?"

"Um- yeah. Quite a few. Is this part of the plan?"

"Chek." I created a simple setup so that the tapper would hit the wire at random intervals. It'd make the Net access look even more splotchy and broken. Hopefully, it'd also force the receptionist to make a call into Artoras and set me up for this whole thing.

I activated Blackout once more and headed for the door. It was almost time.

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