10:43:39 Tuesday, 16 January 2063 - 17030 228th Ave NE, Redmond Seattle

Mac smirked and nodded, but it was short lived on her lips.

"Got it. Believe me, if I see my opportunity, I won't miss it." She popped the last piece of orange between her lips as she considered just what she thought she was capable of when it came to de Medici which led her to her next question.

"If we're able to get the case and the AI... Are we going to destroy it?"

11:39:07 Tuesday, 16 January 2063 - 17030 228th Ave NE, Redmond Seattle

Tristan paused, tilting his head to the side. "I can think of only one reason not to, and that reason is outweighed by every other instinct I have."

He shrugged, turning once more towards the cots. "Your watch."

Mac nodded. "Yep. Sleep well."

If the swordsman replied, she didn't hear it. This building was not as solid as the warehouse had been, or perhaps it was just the smaller area that made it seem colder somehow. And noise, the pulse of city traffic was clearly audible as the morning wore on. After several minutes, she sent a text to Kovacs letting him know she was on duty. It seemed the smart thing to do so he wouldn't try and reach Tristan by mistake. She received a terse reply that included their estimated return time.

Standing, she pulled all the surveillance feeds into her AR so she could keep track while she wandered around. She also wanted to practice utilizing her AR more. The confusion she felt during yesterday's firefight still frightened her, and she knew the solution lay in adapting to the information display that Kovacs used. It wasn't easy to focus past the holographic images playing at a fifty percent mask over her vision, she was either ignoring them or paying too much attention. She also moved them around in her vision, trying out the corners like Kovacs did before moving them to the lower half of her vision. She tried narrow sidebars, too, but those proved to be too distorted. In the end, she moved them all to the upper half of her vision, dividing that section into four equal quadrants for the incoming feeds.

The clatter of the garage door interrupted her experiments, and she turned to see Kovacs' truck braking to a halt next to the Roadmaster. Suda was out of the cabin almost immediately, her face a mask of concentration over the shapeless bundle held in her arms. She disappeared into one of the secluded back alcoves. Kovacs stepped down from the truck carrying a stack of cardboard take-out boxes. He passed one to Mac. She wasn't particularly hungry but she took it anyway, casting a questioning glance at the tall samurai.

"Texas potato," he replied. "Baked potato stuffed with BBQ pork, beans, and coleslaw. Everything you need to keep your energy up for tonight."

11:56:33 Tuesday, 16 January 2063 - 17030 228th Ave NE, Redmond Seattle

Mac did her best to keep from wrinkling her nose, but it sounded about the furthest thing she could have wanted after the orange and protein bar she snagged from Tristan’s stash, but she also knew that if she didn’t make an attempt at eating it, she’d never hear the end of it. The samurai was distracted by managing the food and his attention was split somewhere else to the point that Mac felt like she might as well have been alone in the vehicle bay.

“Did you and Suda get everything you needed this morning?”

“Yes. Did you sleep.”

“Like a rock.”

“Good.”

Their back and forth with small talk questions and near one-word answers continued until the pair descended into silence and Kovacs finished eating, the hood of his truck a makeshift table for the time being, keeping a certain amount of distance between them.

Mac set her food on top of the empty case beside her, barely touched but she needed to clear the air between them before it spiraled out of control or it bled any further into the job at hand. As she crossed the space, Kovacs turned to face her, silent and stone faced as he stared at a point beyond her. Mac chewed on her lip as the tension from the night before swirled around them. They stood just enough distance apart that they could have their silent face-off until one of them broke, and Mac knew better than to think it would be him. She rolled her eyes and sighed heavily when she couldn't take the silence anymore.

She barely waited until Kovacs acknowledged her before she leaned forward and placed her hands on the hood of the truck, caging him between her arms. Using her body as leverage and to get him to focus entirely on her, she pinned him back against the quarter panel and raised her arms until her hands pushed against his chest. Her pulse was racing and her words were hard even though her voice waivered as her eyes bore into his. Her hands clenched into fists out of frustration.

"You are the most frustrating person I have ever met.” Mac watched his face, especially his eyes for some kind cue before she continued. “You make me question everything I do, and more importantly feel." As her voice softened slightly, her hands slowly relaxed and she let her fingers spread back out against his chest, feeling the beat of his heart beneath the fabric. She continued before he could voice the question she could see in his eyes or before he could completely close himself off to her again.

"You make me feel something Kovacs...Something real. And it terrifies me, but not nearly as much as the thought of my life without you in it." She shivered against him at the thought, leaning forward until their foreheads touched, their lips just centimeters apart. Her voice was just a whisper as the world outside and around them disappeared into silence as far as she was concerned.

"I don't know how to do this...how to do us, but I do know whatever comes next I don't want to do it without saying I'm sorry."

12:15:42 Tuesday, 16 January 2063 - 17030 228th Ave NE, Redmond Seattle

Although Kovacs wasn't exactly sure what Mac felt she had to apologize for, he knew that asking would not achieve anything constructive. Instead, he slipped his left arm around her waist, pulling her tight against him so he could kiss her. He could still feel the tension in her body, though, and knew what it was that was driving her. He wished that there was some way to explain, some method to articulate what it was that he was trying to prepare her for. But he couldn't take the time to lay out how easy it was to deal with success, nor just how difficult it would be to survive the trauma of failure. Assuming that either of them lived through that eventuality. He didn't have the language necessary to lay it bare before her without once more crossing into the territory that upset her in the first place. Instead, he redirected.

"You're not the first person who's accused me of being difficult," he said softly, keeping her close, the fingers of his synthetic hand gently stroking the back of her neck. "But you're the first who's stuck around afterwards. Here's hoping I'm worth it."

Mac let out an involuntary half-snort, half-giggle, turning her head up to kiss him again. "Probably not, but the sex is good."

He smiled, leaning back against the truck, his arms still tight around her. "Figures. Girls are always after the dick. And the truck, too."

"Oh yeah," Mac rolled her eyes, resting against him, the tension in her posture gone. "That machine is every girls' wet dream."

Silence enveloped them once more, but this time it was a warm, comfortable one. Mac stared at the surveillance displays in her AR, resting her head on his chest and listening to the dull thunder of his heartbeat. His hands had slipped beneath her jacket, their warmth palpable through the thin material of her shirt.

"Drift will relieve you at seventeen hundred. There's food here for him when he gets up. And some for Tristan as well, I don't know how long he'll be down for. I'm going to get some sleep. Make sure nothing disturbs Suda. Calling up a great form requires a lot of concentration. And if she comes running, hit the alarm and get out as fast as you can. It means something went wrong and the spirit is loose. Nine times out of ten they simply head back to wherever she called them from. But you definitely don't want to be in the vicinity if it decides to stick around and wreak havoc." Kovacs laid out his instructions in something softer than his usual mechanical way. And despite his statement, he made no move to extricate himself from Mac's embrace, the minutes stretching out.

"Thought you were going to get some rest?" she prompted.

"I am," he replied, not moving, his hands tracing patterns over her back. "In a minute."

12:21:09 Tuesday, 16 January 2063 - 17030 228th Ave NE, Redmond Seattle

Mac couldn't help the smile that pulled at the corners of her mouth as she took the extra time to memorize the feeling of his body against hers, the feeling of his hands, the pace of his breathing and the rhythm of his heartbeat. Everything that lent itself to this feeling of calm that had come over her since she apologized. She knew this was the last time they'd get to be this close before the run so she savored every second while she could. Her hands snaked under the hem of his shirt, desperate to feel the sensation of his skin beneath her fingertips as they spread across his lower back and slowly but firmly climbed higher.

Though it nearly killed her, after a long few moments of giving into exploring his body with her hands, she pulled back just slightly putting enough distance between them to get her head on straight. She looked up at him, chewing on her lip as the desire burned dark in her eyes and she growled softly in frustration of an entirely different kind.

“You need to rest, and if you let me keep doing that I'm going to need more than just my hands on you.”

12:47:31 Tuesday, 16 January 2063 - 17030 228th Ave NE, Redmond Seattle

Kovacs chuckled, stretching out his shoulders. "All right. Come find me when you're off watch."

The tall samurai gave her one last kiss before extricating himself from her embrace and disappearing into the back of his truck. Once more silence descended on the warehouse, and Mac was alone with her thoughts. Well, mostly silent and mostly alone. After a minute she could tell that there was a low susurrous of sound coming from the rear of the building. She shivered, recalling Kovacs' words about the great form and what would happen if the cat shaman wasn't successful in her conjuring.

The minutes seemed to crawl by as she watched the AR feeds of the surveillance cameras. She tried to imagine what she would do if something actually happened, if a Winternight cell suddenly found them. There wasn't a big red panic button on the console, and she didn't know if broadcasting an alert over the network would be enough to rouse the rest of the team. Or if it would be enough to break Suda's concentration and set off that catastrophic chain of events. Almost unconsciously her hand found its way to the pistol holstered at her hip.

Mac shook her head. How long ago had it been when the only thing on her had been skin-tight clothes and a condom? Was it just ten days ago that she was lying broken on the floor of Studio Milan? Memories bubbled unbidden to the surface of her mind, dark flashes of pain and fear. The night at Studio Milan. The fight in the alleyway. de Medici. Holly Anne. The fight at the warehouse. Gulfen and Mario.

And through it all was Kovacs, his touch swimming through her mind like a shark through dark waters, a mere presence until it was close enough to strike.

He was simultaneously everything she'd always wanted and everything she'd always tried to avoid. No relationships, no complications, no one behind her walls.

And yet there he was, his mark on her unmistakable. Even now her body ached for his touch, her skin alive with the memories of his rope burning across it, his hands grappling her to him, his fists, his teeth, sweet lord his mouth.

Mac hugged her arms tight around her, staring at the back of Kovacs' truck.

14:19:26 Tuesday, 16 January 2063 - 17030 228th Ave NE, Redmond Seattle

The door to the Roadmaster cammed open, and Mac glanced up in some surprise. Given that Drift wasn't slated to relieve her for another few hours she figured he'd take as much time as possible to rest. The ork emerged from the heavy van, stretching his back with a groan. Opening up the rear doors, he rummaged through one of the lockers, pulling out a Dopp kit and microfiber towel, a packet of chemical towelettes, and a five liter jug of water. Without further ado and with no regard for modesty, he stripped down out of his clothes and began showering with the chemical towelette.

Mac blinked in surprise, turning away to give him a modicum of privacy. After a few minutes she heard the water splash, Drift cursing softly at its chill. She waited another couple of minutes before risking another glance. The ork had hung his Dopp kit from the rear door of the Roadmaster, using a small hand mirror sewn into the inner flap to shave. Finished with the razor, he brushed his teeth before cleaning up the kit and stashing it back where it belonged. From the same locker came a clean jumpsuit and pair of boxers. Lacing his boots on, Drift stood and ran a hand through his hair, sweeping his gaze around the back of the Roadmaster. Apparently satisfied, he closed the rear doors and ambled over to where Mac sat.

She gestured towards one of the cardboard takeout boxes. "Kovacs brought lunch."

"Aw yeah, potato," smiled the ork as he opened the top one. Seating himself next to Mac he dug in happily.

"Anything going on?" he asked between bites.

14:27:13 Tuesday, 16 January 2063 - 17030 228th Ave NE, Redmond Seattle

Mac shook her head as she drained what was left in the plastic water bottle beside her before recapping it and tossing it into a trash bag, her half-eaten potato the only evidence left of her lunch.

"Nothing much. It's been pretty quiet so far, thankfully."

Drift grinned around a forkful of food.

"Good. Let's hope it stays that way."

Mac nodded with a slight smile of her own even though she still felt like she was expecting the other shoe to drop. Not that she was overly pessimistic, more like realistic based off the way she grew up. When things were looking up, something always came along to keep her on her toes, or knock her off her feet. She broke her gaze from the rigger's face, her attention pulled back to the truck for a lingering moment before she was focusing back on her AR.

"Anything you need to do that you could use an extra hand with?"

She didn't quite expect Drift to accept her offer being that she was on watch, but she couldn't just sit idly by with as quiet as it had been and not offer to pull her own weight.

14:42:28 Tuesday, 16 January 2063 - 17030 228th Ave NE, Redmond Seattle

Drift shook his head. "Pretty much all done now. Just gotta wait for the go signal. I do need to make a quick run to the storage unit to get the hard armor. But that should only take me half an hour or so."

Mac nodded, rubbing her hands on her pant legs. "Right."

"It gets to everyone," said Drift, balling up the remains of his potato into the foil it arrived in. "The waiting, the tension. It's just nerves. It's always hard to wait when you know the bubble's going to go up. In some ways it's easier not having a definitive timeline."

Mac blew out her breath in a conscious effort not to shout. "But there's nothing clear! You and Kovacs and Tristan act like we've got everything nailed to the last detail but there's no idea, no answer as to what is really going on!"

"Sometimes you get a little more clarity, sometimes a little less. The uncertainty comes with the job." Drift shrugged. "The Johnson's only tell us what they think is enough to get the job done because anything more and we become a liability, anything less and we may not succeed. Usually it's not enough and we've got to fill in details on our own. But even that isn't all that precise because the people we talk to are all about the latest rumor and third hand info and supposition and conjecture."

He turned towards her. "The things that are concrete in this business? This," he said, pointing to her pistol. "And your team. Everything else is suspect."

"Yah, I get that," grimaced Mac, "I'm beyond it, really. I want to know how you do it, how do you weigh the possible courses of action? How do you pick one outcome over another?"

"If you live through enough of it, you start to understand how the suits think, how corporations train their operators, what they look at bottom line-wise. You develop an instinct for when the job is on the level and when the Johnson is sending you on a suicide run. There's no manual to study, no instruction book. Just the way of the streets."

And just like that it started to make sense to her. The parallel with her old life surfacing in response to Drift's words, how a girl learned to navigate the harsh realities of the pimps and the johns and her fellow sister-whores, who to trust and who not to, how to play off the men against each other and how to keep yourself safe. She laughed, a dark humor to the situation that reminded her so much of how Tristan and Kovacs joked. Drift glanced at her with mild concern, but she shook her head, leaning forward to give him a hug.

"I'll see you when you get back."

15:26:19 Tuesday, 16 January 2063 - 17030 228th Ave NE, Redmond Seattle

She watched as Drift maneuvered the Roadmaster out of the bay and around the other vehicles. Her gaze strayed once the garage door had rolled back down without incident. Something had pulled her attention from the feeds in her AR, and she turned towards it. The volume of sound coming from the rear of the building had escalated and Mac instantly tensed, trying to decipher if it was something that was cause for alarm or par for the course. She cursed her extreme lack of knowledge and experience with magic and relaxed only slightly when she had convinced herself Suda hadn’t exited the back of the building at a sprint and the noise while louder was more sustained and consistent.

She must be getting closer to the end…

Shaking her head, Mac shuffled through her AR feeds as the minutes rolled by, occasionally bringing one to the forefront or enlarging it enough if something caught her eye. The traffic around the abandoned weigh station was scarce and sporadic at best, which made it a great space to take over and clearly be able to monitor the comings and goings in the immediate vicinity. Something nagged at her and she pulled the feed from one of Drift’s overhead drones to near 100% and she focused her full attention on a non-descript beige Americar that was making its way through the nearby surface streets. She watched its path as it navigated around in overlapping loops, much like the way Kovacs had driven the night they had met up with de Medici. Adrenaline began to prickle her skin as she continued to watch the sedan, glancing at the timestamp in the lower corner of her commlink and cursed softly. She gripped the edge of the case she was perched on until her knuckles turned white. Drift had projected his return about the same time that the car had caught her eye. She tried to rationalize the car’s presence silently as she opened up a channel directly to Drift.

They’re either lost or looking for us. And if Drift comes back in this moment he could lead them straight back...

We might have company sniffing around. What’s your ETA? Might want to delay until I can get a better grasp on who, or what is out there.

She captured a set of stills and sent them off to Drift knowing the rigger would quickly pull the drone feeds for himself if he wasn’t actively monitoring them already. She continued to track the movements of the Ford and quietly prayed someone had just wandered off grid instead of the alternative as she slid off the case and waited for either confirmation from Drift or further proof of the Americar’s intentions before she’d move to the back of the truck.

15:41:36 Tuesday, 16 January 2063 - 17030 228th Ave NE, Redmond Seattle

I'm five minutes out, I've got eyes on. Get everyone up and ready.

It was the answer that Mac was expecting. She figured it would be better safe than sorry, especially given everything that they'd learned in the interim. In an effort to delay waking him, she moved around the truck towards where the cots were laid out. Tristan was sleeping face down, one arm pillowed beneath his head, the other draped over the side of the cot. She reached out and waggled his foot.

"Tristan!" she called. He was up like a snake striking, his body coiled, a knife in his left hand. Mac jumped back, holding both hands in front of her.

"Whoa!"

"What's up? Trouble?" he asked, his voice calm, his eyes alert. She nodded.

"Biege Americar circling the block like they're casing the joint. Drift is five minutes out, he's got eyes on."

The swordsman nodded, zipping up his armored jacket as Mac talked. His sword came free of its sheathe with a wet hiss.

"Kovacs?"

"Resting." Mac gestured towards the truck behind her.

"I'll get him. Grab your subgun and cover Suda. If anything gets past us, waste it."

Mac nodded, again mildly aggrieved that she was relegated to babysitting the shaman, but she knew the tactical realities of the situation dictated that the team's most combat capable personnel should man the front lines. She jogged to her cot to scoop up the P93, draping the sling over her shoulder and doing her best to recall Kovacs' lessons with the weapon. Tristan pounded on the side of the truck, a sharp series of rhythmic raps. Moments later Kovacs rolled out the back door of the truck behind his Ares Alpha. Data tags suddenly sprouted to life in AR and for a moment Mac was confused until she realized that the swordsman, samurai, and rigger were coordinating and communicating via the graphics.

Already she could see that Drift was moving into position, flanking the Americar as it turned in towards the block their warehouse occupied again. Tristan and Kovacs were out the door like ghosts, moving like shadows across the terrain to their ambush positions. Mac's palms were sweaty on the plastic grip of her weapon, and she desperately wanted to wipe them on her pant legs again. The beige car pulled over to the side of the road. Tension wound thick in the air. Mac stared at her AR display, waiting for the inevitable ripping gunfire.

The driver's side door opened. A man got out.

Mac realized she was holding her breath, and she forced herself to take a gulp of air.

Team, Actual, stand down. All clear, stand down.

She watched as Tristan emerged from his place of concealment, casually strolling the scant few meters to the vehicle. He didn't broadcast his conversation over the net, but Mac could see him gesturing as he and the driver spoke.

The garage door scrolled up in response to Drift's command, the Roadmaster nosing carefully into the warehouse. Kovacs followed, his rifle slung muzzle down over his tac gear. His long strides carried him towards her, and Mac stood, finding an uncomfortable restlessness in her muscles.

"You ok?" he asked, his voice just human enough that she knew he was asking about more than just her health.

"Yeah," she nodded, finally taking the opportunity to rub her hands on her pants. She'd been gripping the weapon so tightly that her palms were ridged from the grip pattern. "Who are those guys?"

Kovacs reached out and captured her hands in his, rubbing them gently. His face, though, twisted in something between disdain and disgust. "Mafia. They're the back up that O'Malley sent. Lucky they didn't get killed. Tristan is organizing them, he'll put 'em to work."

15:53:49 Tuesday, 16 January 2063 - 17030 228th Ave NE, Redmond Seattle

She shook her head, both in disappointment that Tristan’s suspicions about those that O’Malley would send were correct as much as the fact that she had to rally the team in the first place. She cast a glance back towards Suda and was relieved to see the woman unaffected by the close call, as engrossed in her summoning if not more so than she was before. At least there was that upside. Mac looked down to where Kovacs held her hands, letting his touch ground her back to reality and breathed out the remaining adrenaline that made her tremble.

“I’m sorry I had to wake you. Especially for those brainless douchecanoes,” She couldn’t help but smile softly up at him. “From your poker face, I’m guessing you’ve got no love lost for them either.”

She gave his hands a squeeze and took a step away from where she had settled in to watch over Suda, gently tugging him with her. There was a feeling of unease that permeated the space where the shaman was casting that left Mac wanting to put as much distance between herself and whatever Suda might awaken.

“Now that the excitement’s died down, I’m good with giving her all the space she needs. Besides, you still need to sleep.”

16:19:27 Tuesday, 16 January 2063 - 17030 228th Ave NE, Redmond Seattle

Kovacs let Mac lead them back towards the truck, although he shook his head at her last statement.

"Can't go down for rest now, it would take too long. I'm at a little over three hours, which will be enough to get me through. Especially once we're juiced. Speaking of."

He opened the rear doors of the truck again, flipping back the camping pad and sleeping bag to reveal the utility lockers in the bed. Lifting up the right one, he rummaged through the gear within before coming out with a thin, flat plastic case. Opening it revealed a brace of four single use injectors. Kovacs handed one to Mac.

"It'll be good for about two to three hours. We'll take 'em en route to the target. You ever done jazz or novacoke before?"

"Nova once or twice," shrugged Mac, taking the syringe and dropping it into one of her inner jacket pockets.

"Multiply it by a hundred and that's what it's going to feel like."

Mac raised an eyebrow. "With the jitters and everything?"

"No, it's smooth, you just feel accelerated. The crash is brutal, though, so start a timer when you punch it and keep an eye on it. You're going to want to be sitting down when it wears off." Kovacs shook his head ruefully.

"Lesson learned?" she asked.

"From someone else," he replied, "but definitely one I remember."

He closed the the locker and tidied up the back of the truck. Tristan picked the moment to appear, his sword resting casually over his shoulder.

"All set, they're moving out."

"Good. Grab your hard armor from the back of the Roadmaster and make sure you're good to go. Mac and I are going for food in an hour and then as soon as Suda's done we'll get up on mission time."

"Where are you going?" Food was the only thing that piqued the swordsman's interest, although he followed as Kovacs led the three of them towards the Roadmaster.

"HansBertos."

That answer seemed to please Tristan. "Make mine the special," he replied promptly. The side cargo door slid open at their approach, although Drift didn't move from the rigger couch. Mac could see that the rigger was already suited up in a bulky set of armor. She assumed that it was the hard armor that Kovacs kept referring to. Three heavy duffel bags rested in the back of the van. Tristan grabbed one, then passed it to Kovacs. Mac could see the samurai's name stenciled on it. Kovacs hefted it over his shoulder and headed back towards the truck.

"We don't have time to get you a set of hard armor," he explained to Mac. "It's fit personally to you and you wear it like a jumpsuit."

"Figured that," she replied. "I'll just stand behind you guys."

A wry smile twisted the samurai's lips. "Excellent plan."

16:25:53 Tuesday, 16 January 2063 - 17030 228th Ave NE, Redmond Seattle

Sure, provided they don’t get behind us.

Mac managed a smile of her own in return as she reluctantly started back towards the console to finish out her watch. It was well less than an hour now, but she wasn’t about to duck out of her share of the responsibilities. She tossed one last look over her shoulder and laughed softly as Kovacs was already back to reorganizing gear in the back of his truck. Tristan was off to the side, verifying the contents of his own duffle bag and Drift was once again closed up inside the Roadmaster.

As she sat back down and straddled one of the hard cases again, she was surprised with how normal this was beginning to feel. Mac wasn’t quite sure when she a grown more comfortable with the changes in her life, but while the looming tension of the job was still palpable, and she still hadn’t managed to control the ups and downs and spikes of adrenaline, there was definitely a new awareness of each team member’s routines and even their quirks that she found soothing. She fished out her dwindling pack of cigarettes and placed one between her lips before lighting up. Returning her pack to her pocket her fingers brushed against the syringe Kovacs had given her and she withdrew it and twisted it between her fingers as she stared at it almost as if it could bite her. It wasn’t like she hadn’t done countless drugs before, but this one with all its warnings, made her nervous.

When she looked up, Kovacs stood near her, his lips compressed in his signature tight line as he watched her as if he could read the thoughts in her head. She slipped the auto-injector back into her pocket for safe keeping and shook her head to clear it.

“Whatever it takes, right?”

18:02:08 Tuesday, 16 January 2063 - 17030 228th Ave NE, Redmond Seattle

"Indeed. Whatever it takes," agrees Kovacs, and his words spur a memory in Mac. She wondered, had she known then what she knows now, if she would have been so insistent on staying with the man who'd saved her life only to embroil her in this nightmare. The answer came to her immediately.

Absolutely.

He motions towards the truck. "C'mon, let's get some food for everyone."

"But I still have half an hour left on my shift," she protested. The tall samurai shook his head. "Flexible. People are up and about now, Drift has got the surveillance, there isn't a need to have someone manning the console now."

Mac shrugs. "All right, let's roll."

The ride over to the restaurant takes almost forty minutes, the crush of traffic penning them in. Kovacs let's the autopilot drive, trusting Grid Guide to get them through the stop and go of commuters heading home at the end of the workday. He reclines his seat a little, making it comfortable for Mac to sit in his lap and prop her feet up on the dashboard. It takes a moment to arrange as both of them are wearing/carrying gear, but then she's resting easy against him, his arms draped over her. As much as she wants more, the closeness is enough for now.

Pulling into the parking lot, they disentangle themselves reluctantly and head inside the plain, unassuming storefront. Although they've been to Locus' place next door several times, Mac hasn't really paid attention to the adjacent restaurant. With her eyes on the menu, though, she makes a sudden realization.

"German Mexican fusion?"

Kovacs nods. "Their burritos are really good."

"I don't know, putting sauerkraut in a burrito seems like madness to me." Mac shot him a skeptical look. He shrugged.

"Don't knock it 'til you tried it."

In the end, Mac splits the difference, ordering a knackwurst burrito with rice and beans and a sweet mango salsa. Tristan's special turns out to be three burritos, while Kovacs get himself and Drift a house blend burrito of schnitzel and sauerkraut. Suda gets a triplet of turkey and havarti taquitos. A couple of large bags of tortilla chips and pretzel rolls round out the order. Mac can't resist getting herself a churro. Kovacs chuckles, although it gives her something to snack on while they're waiting for their food to come up.

On the road again, Kovacs lets the truck drive, impatiently unwrapping his burrito and chowing down. Mac thought initially she could wait until they got back to the warehouse, but the smell is overwhelming and the churro did nothing but rouse her hunger. She was surprised at just how good her burrito was. And how large. She barely managed to finish half before calling it quits, and that only a few minutes before the pulled into the garage. Somehow Kovacs had made his disappear. Mac shook her head, a smile on her lips as she mentally compared him to Tristan.

The swordsman was waiting eagerly for them, his eyes alight as they stepped down out of the truck. He held out his hands towards the bags of food Mac was carrying.

"Yes, come to daddy!"

18:17:13 Tuesday, 16 January 2063 - 17030 228th Ave NE, Redmond Seattle

Mac giggled at the over-eager swordsman, tucking the bags behind her back for a minute.

“Have you been good while we were gone?” She flashed him a teasing smile, her eyes dancing as she watched his face.

“I cannot confirm nor deny, for I am a gentleman.” He circled her like she was prey and Mac dangled the bag containing his food in front of him until he pulled it from her hands with a growl that caused a rich laugh to spill from her lips.

“There’s plasticware in there too you know.”

“No need.” Tristan mumbled around a mouthful of the burrito he had already nearly destroyed in just a few bites.

“Animal.”

As the comment earned her a grin, Mac settled up onto the hood of the truck, perching in what had become one of her favorite places just for the warmth alone. She watched as Kovacs delivered food to Drift who remained tucked up inside the Roadmaster before he returned to her and she offered him the space before her against the hood of the truck. Once he accepted, she wasted no time draping her legs around him and snaking her arms around his chest. She was going to take every advantage of staying close to him as long as it didn't interfere with planning and prep for tonight.

As the space descended into a comfortable silence other than Tristan devouring food, Mac nodded towards the bag that contained Suda's dinner she posed the question dominating her current stream of thoughts.

"Any idea when she might be done?"

18:51:09 Tuesday, 16 January 2063 - 17030 228th Ave NE, Redmond Seattle

Kovacs flicked his glance towards the countdown timer in the corner of his vision.

"Another two and a half hours. According to Suda, conjuring a spirit from the ether is a trivial matter, one that can be done in a second or less. Fixing them so they remain for more than twelve hours, though, takes multiple hours. It's also exhausting, she'll need to go down for a nap until we're ready to depart for the target at 0200."

The samurai rested his arms on Mac's legs, his fingers idly massaging her calves. Tristan was making his way through the second of his three burritos, although he was taking his time with this one. She suspected that he would save the last one for later. Probably a celebratory meal after they completed the job. She let her head rest against the back of Kovacs' neck. He smelled of leather and gun oil and aftershave and sweat. He smelled of home.

Minutes passed as the three of them sat in silence, each with their own thoughts. Although Mac was fairly certain that Kovacs was still active virtually, probably reviewing mission footage, making contingency plans, contacting Isomer with last minute requests. It would fit with his 'no days off' mentality. She wondered if she would ever develop the same mindset and capabilities. She wondered if she wanted to.

Tristan, on the other hand, exuded the same kind of careless relaxation he always did. Having finished his second burrito, the swordsman leaned back in his chair, propping his feet up on the network console with a satisfied burp. "Weapons checks at 0130 then?"

Kovacs nodded. "We'll start the warehouse pack-up and sanitize at midnight thirty, gear up complete by 0130, weapons check and network purge complete by 0200. Out the door at 0200."

"Juice on the road?"

Another nod from the samurai. "Don't forget to start your timer as well."

Tristan rubbed his thighs with a hint of nervousness which Mac found uncharacteristic until she realized that he probably had never taken a dose of Kamikaze. If it was damagingly addictive in only four doses, it made sense that out of all of them, only Kovacs would have cause to have taken it prior to this run. The knowledge that she wouldn't be the only one adjusting to something new buoyed her spirits immensely.

The swordsman quirked an eyebrow towards Kovacs. "Where you stashing your truck?"

"Rollo's place. Mac and I will head over there as soon as I know Suda's finished. We can cab it back."

Mac blinked. "You're going to trust a cab at a time like this? Back to a safe house?"

She could feel Kovacs smile. "It's a different kind of service, called Combat Cab. They're specialists. Expensive, but worth it."

Tristan stretched again, still humming with satisfaction. "Man, as much as I'm looking forward to this being over, everything we do after this is going to seem so passé."

Kovacs glanced at him quizzically. "Seriously? You said the same thing after we crashed the Arcology. And we were taking bigger guns into that one."

"Wait, I thought you said we were breaking out the big guns for this one?" interrupted Mac.

"We're loading heavy, but we have to move fast once inside. Much faster than we moved during our Arcology run," explained Kovacs. "We knew from a couple of other teams who went in before us that there wouldn't be any resupply, and we had to make sure we could meet any threat with overwhelming force. So we packed in an HMG and a pair of LMGs along with our rifles."

"Plus explosives, and the spikes as well," added Tristan. "One-shot disposable missile launchers," he explained when he saw the unfamiliar look on Mac's face.

"Why aren't we bringing those with us this time?" she asked, only a little facetiously.

"No need. The security at the facility doesn't have the kind of armor or drones that necessitate that kind of firepower. Although we will have some explosives with us, just in case we need to make a door quickly," replied Kovacs. The tall samurai motioned to Tristan, who rummaged through his bag before coming out with a thin cylinder and flipping it to Kovacs, who caught it and passed it to Mac. About the size of a can of shaving cream, but much heavier, the gray canister is labeled Charge Demolition / M121A / with taggant (COMP C-12) / MA-62008-012A.

"It's pressurized with nitrogen, just flip the top off and press down to apply," said Kovacs, pointing towards the attached safety cap while passing her another small piece of gear. This one looked like a small, two-tined fork, maybe eight or ten centimeters in length and about a centimeter thick. "Jam that in anywhere that's thick enough to hold it, but make sure the two points are inside the explosive and not exposed, otherwise it may not detonate reliably."

Mac was only a little nervous handling the explosive, gently passing it back to Kovacs, who tossed it carelessly towards Tristan. "You don't have to use much, C-12 is pretty potent. Just foam a doorway, jab the detonator in, and take cover. It'll punch through just about anything short of heavy revetment concrete."

"The foam and plastic stuff are pretty easy to use," interjected Tristan, tucking the gear back into his bag. "It's the other stuff you gotta worry about. Especially thermite and phosphorus. Don't mess around with those unless you really know what you're doing."

19:17:44 Tuesday, 16 January 2063 - 17030 228th Ave NE, Redmond Seattle

Mac shook her head at the idea of playing with volatile substances that could kill her with no experience.

"No worries of that happening anytime soon, even that stuff makes me nervous."

Playing it off with a slight smile, she nodded in the direction of the swordsman's bag. She hid her tell, her real display of nerves behind Kovacs' shoulder and averted her gaze from Tristan's face to a spot just beside him on the wall. She barely shifted behind Kovacs, her habits of putting distance between herself and whatever made her nervous threatening to kick in. Almost instantly, his hands stopped their gentile circles against her legs, his grip turning possessive and pinning her in place at the moment her thoughts threatened to run away with her. He was so attuned to her already, it was like he knew what she was thinking almost before she thought it. The feeling of his fingertips digging hard into her skin stilled her at once and only relented their grip, returning to their slow and lazy circles once she buried her face into the back of his neck again.

They were developing their own form of silent communication and if Tristan was aware, he gave no indication. The swordsman was stretched out in repose his eyes closed and his feet still up on the console. Mac fished a piece of gum from her pocket, her lips curving into a smile against Kovacs' neck as the sugar and artificial cherry flavor burst across her tongue. She tilted her head and brought her lips beside his ear as she whispered.

"As much as I'd love to stay wrapped around you until the very last second, I don't do well with waiting. Give me something to do."

19:26:15 Tuesday, 16 January 2063 - 17030 228th Ave NE, Redmond Seattle

Kovacs nodded, but didn't reply, focused instead on something that Tristan had pointed out.

"Shouldn't be an issue, but we can look at it en-route."

Tilting his head back towards Mac, he pitched his voice for her alone. "Not much to do now but wait. You should check in with your friends, though. Tell them to get out of town, or at least somewhere defensible in case the worst happens. Might also want to put the word out to the working girls to get off the streets tonight. It's liable to get rough out there."

His words triggered a snap of tension through her shoulders, and she mentally kicked herself for not thinking of it sooner. Leaning back, she fished her commlink from her pocket, stabbing at the display to route a call to Frankie.

19:49:21 Tuesday, 16 January 2063 - 17030 228th Ave NE, Redmond Seattle

Mac waited for her call to connect, sliding slightly back on the hood of the truck and untangling herself from Kovacs who made no move to stop her this time. She slipped away from the pair of men, leaving them to continue their discussions, as a cigarette found its way between her lips and she paced the floor.

"Hey girl."

"You're alive."

“For now at least. Listen, it’s not much of a social call,” Mac cut off her friend before she could start getting chatty. “There’s a potential for some real fallout from the events of the past couple of days. Some might blow back on you two. Any chance you can bail out of the city for the next couple of days?”

”You know I can’t afford it…”

“I wouldn’t be asking if it wasn’t serious. Please, for me? Use the extra cash on the sticks I gave you, take our friend and grab a well-deserved vacation,” She shut down the remainder of excuses Frankie might pose before she could open her mouth again. “Can you get the other girls on board? Miranda, Cierra, Vanessa and Brandi Lyn at least. I’m going to notify the network next, can you help blast it wide? It’s already getting late and I know girls are already working… Just promise me you’ll do this, I swear it’ll be the last thing I ask of you for a while.”

”Fine, I’ll do it. Because I know you wouldn’t ask this unless it was this serious. Promise me in return you’ll watch your back and keep in touch?”

“I promise, cross my heart girl.”

Frankie killed the call and Mac knew she was probably already starting to pack and get Mario on board with the plan. She wasted little time sending personal message to the other four girls and a wide-broadcast to the network. She knew some would take her warning seriously and others would scoff at it and chase the almighty nuyen over protecting themselves for a night or two. She couldn't save them all, and truthfully she didn't want to. As long as she could convince Frankie, and a few of the others closer to her to stay safe, her conscience would be clear. She ground out what was left of her cigarette beneath her boot and started back towards the truck.

20:16:47 Tuesday, 16 January 2063 - 17030 228th Ave NE, Redmond Seattle

Mac ignored the multiple incoming text messages to her commlink. She didn't have the time or energy to explain herself to those who didn't believe her. Frankie would clear the girls out, no problem. Inevitably there'd be one or two who wouldn't get the message or who ignored the warning. Some girls always had to push. Rounding the front quarter panel of the truck, she pushed those thoughts away. Something was up; Tristan was sitting forward in his chair, his eyes fixed on the display screen of the network console. Kovacs beckoned with his head, and she reclaimed her spot on the hood of the truck, crossing her arms on his shoulders.

"Surveillance is up on our target and the hand-off location," he elaborated. Mac immediately pulled the feeds into her AR, pairing the windows side by side in the upper half of her vision bloc. She was familiar by now with the lines of the off-line storage warehouse, having run through their infiltration exercise a hundred times or so. Nothing seemed to have changed there, the parking lot was full of the usual vehicles, and street traffic seemed to be flowing at a regular pace. It didn't look like any additional security measures had been instituted, or that there was a welcoming committee waiting for their arrival. After a minute, she let that feed fade into the background in favor of the new location.

The area was as de Medici had described it, a large intersection next to a parking lot, with a few single story commercial buildings surrounding it. The area was lit to a dusk level by a handful of street lights as well as security floods on the buildings. Drift's drone was equipped with low-light, the surveillance images clear as daylight from its overhead orbit. As she watched, data tags appeared overlaying the view. An icon representing the Roadmaster dropped onto the map, pulling up streetside next to the parking lot. Numbers dismounted: Kovacs and Tristan, followed by de Medici, Mac and Suda.

"If it were me," said Tristan, "I'd be on the side street there, headed out."

Amber colored icons blossomed in response to his comment.

Either that or the parking lot. The curb is shallow enough to make a direct exit feasible if you've got something with ground clearance. But yeah, side street makes sense. Drift appended his number to the comment.

A series of diamond shaped cross-hairs plotted themselves on the map, three on the rooftop of the closest buildings, two further out on another building to the southwest that had a distant vantage point on the intersection and parking lot.

Can you service these from the Roadmaster? Kovacs asked, his tone sharp even through the network interface. A wedge of color sprang to life from the Roadmaster, the beaten zone of its onboard weapons. Mac watched as it swept the terrain, pausing when the central azimuth intersected one of the targeting crosshairs.

They're in range, but if they're covering from the southwest I'm not going to be able to give you any suppressive fire.

Accepted. I'll take care of it, just make sure you're on if they've got sniper cover. Kovacs turned towards Tristan. "Make sure everyone's got smoke, just in case."

The swordsman nodded. "Check. It's only going to be plain since Five doesn't have ultrasound."

"Accepted. We can have her fall back if we need to deny thermal. We just need to interdict LOS initially." Kovacs stretched, pushing backwards momentarily before resettling himself. "Everyone stay flexible. One, you've got the snipers and suppressive fire. Two, the Johnson and the package. Three will handle anything astral-powered. Four, cover Two and grab the package if he's engaged. I'll cover your movement and handle anything heavy."

20:26:19 Tuesday, 16 January 2063 - 17030 228th Ave NE, Redmond Seattle

Mac continued to watch the feed from Drift's drone, committing the details of the street and the surrounding buildings to memory, seeking out every nook and cranny Kovacs hadn't already marked as a threat. She couldn't help but smile as he stretched back against her but it was short lived as more pressing matters pertaining to their upcoming objectives jumped to the forefront of her thoughts. She knew what her part in the 'handoff' would be, but while Tristan had assured her mistakes were forgivable, she wanted to be crystal clear on one thing. If deMedici would still be breathing at the end of this.

"Is anything off the table when it comes to obtaining the case?"

21:08:55 Tuesday, 16 January 2063 - 17030 228th Ave NE, Redmond Seattle

Kovacs tilted his head, running to ground the various answers to Mac's question. He was quiet long enough that Tristan popped open an eye at him just to make sure he hadn't missed anything. Finally, he shook his head.

"No, just make sure you clear the backstop before you send anything down range. It's going to be close quarters and personal."

"Got it," Mac nodded. She wasn't sure yet what she planned on doing, but it was reassuring to know that when the time came she would have access to all the tools in her arsenal. She glanced at her P93 where it rested next to the surveillance console. Even if she wasn't very adept with some of them.

Roger, echoed Drift. Overhead surveillance will be persistent until we're clear the meet.

Roger, replied Kovacs. Once we're inbound to the meet, tag anything that looks suspicious. I'll make the call whether or not we go loud without provocation.

Mac shivered, and felt the samurai's hands on her legs in reassurance. Tristan stretched again, carelessly relaxed. "Maybe with my share I'll buy a new sword. Maybe go out to eat someplace nice."

"How nice?" inquired Mac, willing to play along with the swordsman's casual banter.

"Dunno. It's been a hot minute since I've been to the Eye of the Needle."

Kovacs tilted his head again. "I thought you were banned from there?"

Tristan grinned. "Nah, I set it right. Besides, it was all a misunderstanding anyway."

The samurai chuckled. "Well, a hundred grand should get you the best seat in the house."

Mac blinked, replaying the negotiation with de Medici in her head. "Uh, wait. I thought you said two hundred for the job for the team?"

"Forty thousand for each of us, then? That would barely cover our expenses," replied Kovacs. "It's two hundred thousand for each, half up front which is the usual stipulation. But we're only going to see the upfront payment. We know de Medici is going to double cross us, he won't even have the other half of the payment with him."

"Drekhead," commented Tristan drily. Mac barely heard him over the buzzing in her head. One hundred thousand nuyen!

"We hold the upfront payment in a team account, and pay for everything required to complete the run from it. Then the rest gets divided up evenly, with the backside payment going to each individual. Works out the fairest since everyone shoulders part of the load for the gear and expenses of a successful run." Kovacs motioned with his hand as if were cutting up a pie as he explained the logistics to Mac.

"Seems fair to me," she replied with false nonchalance, her head still spinning from the revelation. Something changed that brought both Kovacs and Tristan to sudden alert, the swordsman reaching for his blade while the samurai's hand was on the pistol grip of his assault rifle. It took Mac a moment to realize that it was the cessation of noise from the rear of the warehouse that alerted them. She disengaged from Kovacs just in case he needed to move quickly. Luckily it was Suda who staggered wearily out of the shadows.

"Calm down boys," she sighed, running a tired hand through her hair. "We're golden. But I'm going down for a nap."

Both Kovacs and Tristan relaxed, but made no comment as the slim shaman made her way past them and to the cots. She flopped onto hers without ceremony, rolling over once to cocoon herself in the blankets. Tristan leaned back in his seat again.

"All quiet on the western front."

Kovacs nodded. "All right, we're rolling. We'll be back in a couple hours."

Tristan waved his hand. "Yah yah. Be careful out there."

Mac slid off the hood of the truck, climbing into the passenger seat before Kovacs had fired up the engine. Together they rolled out into the night.

21:39:14 Tuesday, 16 January 2063 - 801 Alder Ave Apt 7, Puyallup, Seattle

Mac recognized the location as they parked in the underground lot, glancing over at Kovacs with an arched eyebrow. The samurai's face, though, was inscrutable in the shadows. He drew her close to him, though, as they rode upstairs in the elevator.

21:57:26 Tuesday, 16 January 2063 - 801 Alder Ave Apt 7, Puyallup, Seattle

"This looks nothing like Rollo's place."

Mac's mouth turned up in a smirk as the Possessive grip of Kovacs' fingers against her hip tightened as they continued the short ride up in the elevator, their connection without words unmistakable as her body responded to his shift from all business to acting on his most primal instincts.

Once again the keycard swiped against the maglock permitted their entrance to the apartment as he ushered her in before him. Once inside he closed the door behind them with enough speed and force that Mac jumped slightly. Looking back over her shoulder she watched as he shrugged out of his coat, moments before peeling hers from her shoulders, letting both fall carelessly to the floor.

He stalked her further into the apartment, his steps forward hers back, like a dance as they navigated over their coats, her eyes darting past him to look down the hallway towards the bedroom expectantly, but he had other plans. With an effortless grace he lifted her, setting her on the edge of the kitchenette counter, his satchel deposited next to her with a heavy thud in the otherwise silent apartment.

His hands moved to her hair, clenching at the back of her head, pulling her to him as his mouth bruised her lips with a kiss that sucked the air out of her at its intensity. Kovacs' hands reached for the hem of her shirt, roughly stripping it upwards, baring the skin beneath it to him as she shook her hair free. His mouth immediately found the skin at the curve of her neck, his lips and teeth marking her and sending a rush of heat through her body as she tilted her head back, offering herself entirely to him.

Her fingers clawed at his back, scrambling to strip him of the remaining barrier between them. She craved the feeling of his skin against hers as she yanked his shirt up and over his head. Her fingers slipped behind her back and deftly released the clasp of her bra, letting is fall from her shoulders. Before she could reach up for the straps, his hand captured her wrists tightly, pinning them behind her keeping her from being able to touch him and it drew a growl from her lips as a sadistic smile appeared on his. His free hand deftly produced a length of jute from his bag, a crude but effective column of rope around her arms replaced his hand at her wrists and forced her chest forward.

Without the use of her hands, Mac was forced to get creative in the way she could keep him close to her. Her eyes glittered darkly as her legs wrapped around his waist, forcefully drawing his body tight against her as her ankles locked at the base of his spine. They were both effectively bound by each other, and as Kovacs wrapped one arm around her back and gathered his satchel in the other, she conceded control to him completely as he slid her off the counter.

22:33:48 Tuesday, 16 January 2063 - 801 Alder Ave Apt 7, Puyallup, Seattle

Kovacs ran Mac into the wall outside the bedroom with bruising force, her hands twisting in their bindings as she growled into his mouth. Turning, he pitched her through the door and onto the bed. She spread herself on impact to keep from bouncing off, curling her legs beneath her to gain some leverage. He thwarted her plans, though, by grabbing her ankles, dragging her pants off and dragging her back until her legs fell off the end of the bed. He pinned her there with a hand in her hair, pressing her face into the bunched up sheet, suffocating her. With a sharp yank, he tore her panties off, a momentary line of fire drawing across her hips that vanished as he slammed into her from behind. Mac cried out at the sudden violation, her head swimming from oxygen starvation, pleasure and pain boiling through her blood. Kovacs wrenched her arms up, using her hair to pull her face out of the covers. Mac managed to get a breath in between her cries before he pushed her face back into the blanket, drowning her. She struggled against him, her muscles burning as he ravaged her, feeling his strength overwhelm her, forcing her to his will. He let her up for air again, timing it with the rhythm of her hips. The sweet rush of oxygen pushed her over the edge, her cries of passion echoing through the room.

She was suddenly free, the rope slithering free from her arms. She pushed herself off the bed, chest heaving, only to feel his hands on her again, yanking her to her feet and slamming her against the wall. He pinned her there with his fists, heavy impacts bruising her back and butt. Her hands clawed against the wall, mouth open and gasping as the endorphins flooded through her. Although Kovacs was relentless, he varied the intensity, working her up with a series of half-powered, half-speed impacts. Mac danced against the wall, arching her back into the lighter blows before crumbling beneath the heavier ones.

She found herself on her knees, a fist wrapped in her hair. Iron fingers jammed themselves into her cheeks, prying her jaws open. She could taste herself on him as he pushed the hard length of himself into her mouth. He held her arms over her head, her wrists captured in his hands as he pinned her against the wall with his hips. She choked, tears streaming down her face as she fought to breathe.

22:53:19 Tuesday, 16 January 2063 - 801 Alder Ave Apt 7, Puyallup, Seattle

Her lungs burned from lack of oxygen, the tears streaming down her cheeks made it near impossible to breathe through her nose and she could only move back millimeters before she was stopped by the wall. She choked and gagged around the length of him, futilely struggling against his iron grip as he continued to press her against the wall with the force of his hips. Toeing the line of passing out, surrendering her last bit of control to him ratcheted up the intensity of the game. As her vision started to grey out she raised her eyes to meet his, silently pleading and full of her submission.

Instantly Kovacs pulled out from her mouth, releasing her wrists at the same time as she fell forward so she could brace herself against the floor on all fours. Gasping for air he gave her only a moment of reprieve before his hands wound in her hair again, dragging her violently away from the wall wringing a scream of pain from her lips, the carpet burning the skin of her hands and knees before he once again moved behind her. He forcefully drove into her with nearly no resistance, the momentum of his body driving hers down against the carpet as he wrenched her arms back behind her holding her with his left hand. His thrusts grew with violent intensity as he used her own body as leverage pressing her face down into the floor, the cool composite of his synthetic fingers gripping the back of her neck as he spent himself inside her, the only moment he ever lost control.

Mac shattered beneath him only a moment after, she lay boneless beneath him as every slight movement of Kovacs' body sent ripples of overwhelming sensation through her, her body clenching around him in the only way she could hold him. She didn't make any attempt at moving, relishing in the feeling of the weight of his body above her as her breathing slowly returned to normal and a sense of calm and control descended on her like nothing she had felt before. In that instant there was no job, there was no fear, there was only him.

23:11:06 Tuesday, 16 January 2063 - 801 Alder Ave Apt 7, Puyallup, Seattle

In one slow movement, Kovacs pulled the top blanket from the bed and rolled them onto their sides, draping it over their bodies as they spooned together in a room that now seemed darker for the fading passion it contained. Shadows lay heavy around them, even to Mac's enhanced vision, the faint glow from the LEDs in the kitchen doing little to push back the night. She could feel the slow, steady thunder of his heart, and the cool ceramic of his synthetic arm draped across her hip. His lips whispered softly against the back of her neck, words of possession falling gently from them, winding around her heart.

Mac pulled his arms around her, pressing her lips to his fingers. She wanted to believe that this moment would never end, that there was no greater reality waiting outside the door, nothing for them but the warmth of their bodies and the whispered promises in the dark. The intensity of it all frightened her and thrilled her equally. Kovacs' passion was intoxicating, fierce and possessive. It awakened something equally intense within her, a hunger to submit to his demands, to offer her body for pain or pleasure at his whim.

"Tell me something true," she whispered softly.

Kovacs kissed the back of her neck, silent for a moment. She felt him press his nose into the nest of her hair, inhaling her scent. Then he smiled.

"Juan de Marco said 'There are only four questions of importance in life: What is sacred? Of what is the spirit made? What is worth living for? What is worth dying for? The answer to all of these is the same: Only love.'"

23:19:01 Tuesday, 16 January 2063 - 801 Alder Ave Apt 7, Puyallup, Seattle

Mac stilled in his arms at his words as she closed her eyes and for at least a moment she let herself believe in his truth. The idea of love was foreign to her, she had always experienced some twisted form of it as she grew up and it jaded her, her lifestyle forcing her to keep everyone at arm’s length. With him though it was different, she had already let him in way beyond anyone else and if she thought about it he ignited some small spark of hope inside her for something more, something real.

As his arms tightened their hold around her, it snapped her back into the moment and still she couldn’t keep the soft smile from her lips. She melted back against him as he buried his face in the back of her neck again, neither of them wanting to break their embrace nor leave their nest of blankets. She was content to pretend the world outside them didn’t exist for as long as possible, be that a few minutes more or forever. She twisted in his arms so that she was facing him, able to look into his eyes as she traced the angle of his jawline with a finger and snaked her leg over his just to stay close and connected, able to share the soft smile that said everything she couldn’t find the words for.

Kovacs made her feel so raw, so open, so vulnerable. And for the first time she wasn’t trying to run from it.

23:47:28 Tuesday, 16 January 2063 - 801 Alder Ave Apt 7, Puyallup, Seattle

Kovacs trailed his fingers across Mac's cheek, cradling her face and tasting her lips in slow, soft kiss that seemed to go on for an hour. She purred, rubbing against him as his arms held her close, even though she knew what the words were going to be when next he spoke.

"Don't say it," she whispered. "Just let me stay here with you."

He kissed her forehead, and each trembling eyelid.

"We have to go," he said softly, his voice tinged with regret. Mac clung to him fiercely, willing him to stay. In the end, he simply picked her up and carried her to the bathroom with him. Once more he washed her as they stood beneath the warm spray of the shower, his hands gentle on her skin. When it was her turn, Mac lingered as long as she could, not to try and extend the moment, but to try and fix him in her memory. Every aspect, every scar, every muscle committed to memory. They dressed wordlessly, girding themselves with armor and weapons for the upcoming conflict. Together, they disappeared once more into the enveloping night of the city.

00:16:09 Wednesday, 17 January 2063 - 17030 228th Ave NE, Redmond Seattle

Mac scanned the area around the warehouse as Kovacs paid for the cab. Truth be told, she didn't see what was so special about the service. The vehicle looked like an average checker cab, their driver seemed unremarkable. It must be some other aspect of the service that made it worth the cost. Finished, she followed the samurai into the warehouse. Tristan waved from the console without turning around.

"Pack your stuff," instructed Kovacs to Mac. "Once you're done, cover the console for Tristan."

00:34:29 Wednesday, 17 January 2063 - 17030 228th Ave NE, Redmond Seattle

Mac simply nodded, all too aware of the shift of everyone’s mood and demeanor into ops mode, and set off back towards the cots. She forced herself to work quietly when she noticed Suda was still wrapped up in her blanket cocoon. She shrugged out of her coat and started repacking the limited gear she had used while they were in this space. It wasn’t long before she was cinching the straps tight and looking at her entire life condensed into two simple bags. She shook her head as she settled her coat back around her and hefted one bag over her shoulder and hand-carried the duffel bag back out to the console. She set her things down and out of the way, making a second trip to secure her small arsenal of weapons before she sat down beside Tristan.

“I’m up. Your turn to go pack.”

Settling in, she kept her attention focused on the small console screen and didn’t even look up as Tristan started to walk away without another word. There was plenty of activity happening around her, but the only way she was managing to keep her head in the game was to watch the camera feeds rotating in succession and focus on what was in front of her in the moment.

01:17:46 Wednesday, 17 January 2063 - 17030 228th Ave NE, Redmond Seattle

Neither Tristan nor Kovacs took long to pack, most of their gear having already been staged to go. The samurai woke Suda right at 0100, giving her time to freshen up and have a snack while they broke down the cots and stashed them in the back of the Roadmaster. Shortly after, Drift transferred all the surveillance feeds to his console, and Mac helped Tristan break down the portable one as well as collect up the various cameras and wires the team had strung throughout the warehouse. While they were busy, Drift completed the handover of the surveillance, purging all the data they'd accumulated from the portable console and shutting it down. Once finished, she and Tristan muscled the unit into the back of the Roadmaster as well, securing it with several tie-downs.

Tristan stretched his arms over his head, rolling out his shoulders, then started to undress. When he was down to his t-shirt and boxers, he pulled on the lower half of his hard armor suit. Mac could see that it was a form-fitting jumpsuit with tailored ceramic armor pieces joined to it. The top zipped up, then covered with a monolithic front plate carrier that he draped over his shoulders before latching it down with side buckles. The whole ensemble was done in a light gray/dark gray/black snakeskin camo pattern, even the multitude of pouches that strapped on to the armor pieces. He checked the ride and load of the pouches as well, working methodically left to right, top to bottom.

Mac was mildly surprised to see him sling a submachine gun muzzle down across the armor.

"Not everyone is conveniently within sword's reach," explained Tristan, having caught a bit of her expression. Kovacs came around the corner of the truck, geared up in an identical suit of armor but weighed down with a handful more weapons than the swordsman. For all of his gear, though, he still moved with an unnatural silence and speed. He passed Mac her P93.

"Suda's almost ready. We're going to go over our set up with each other, so everyone knows who has what, where. Don't worry if you don't have a particular piece of gear, that's not the important thing. What's important is that you know where a teammate's medkit is located, or which pouch to go to for grenades, or reloads, or whatever."

Mac nodded, dropping the sling of her weapon over her head and adjusting its ride. Suda came around the corner, looking sleek and lethal in her armor.

"All right, which one of you boys thought it would be funny to shrink this thing in the dryer?" she groused, pulling at the crotch of the jumpsuit. After a moment, both Kovacs and Tristan pointed silently at Drift's recumbent form, strapped into the command chair.

If they're pointing at me, they're lying, said the rigger over the comm. The shaman glanced at the two standing in front of her.

"Uh huh. Jokers. Good thing I'm wearing a thong, otherwise this wedgie would be completely uncomfortable."

"Gear checks?" prompted Kovacs, stepping on whatever rude comment was about to come out of Tristan's mouth. The swordsman sighed at the wasted opportunity, but managed to get a wink off at Mac, who just rolled her eyes in return.

"Go," nodded Suda, echoed a moment later by Tristan and then Mac. The four of them stood in a square facing each other.

"Respirator?" Three of them held up ballistic face shields with built in gas masks, while Mac touched the unit dangling around her neck.

"Medkit?" Hands went to pouches, withdrawing small packs of various sizes. Mac touched the pouch on her battle belt just behind her left hip, remembering the day at the Emporium when she and Kovacs bought most of her kit.

"Smoke grenades?" Fat cylinders made their appearances, Mac hefting the two that Tristan had given her earlier before dropping them back into the pouch just forward of her left hip.

"Offensive grenades?" She didn't have any, but noted the pouches that both Tristan and Kovacs opened to reveal theirs.

"SMG ammo?" Mac noticed that both she, Kovacs, and Suda were carrying P93s, while Tristan's was something else. She made a note, though, of where the others kept their loaded magazines.

Team, Actual, comm check, lace up by numbers.

One, loud and clear.

Two, loud and clear.

Three, said Suda. Kovacs glanced at her but said nothing.

Four, loud and clear. Mac didn't wait for whatever the samurai was going to say.

Roger. Mount up.

Silently the piled into the Roadmaster. Suda dropped into the jumpseat in the rear, drawing the harness tight over herself. Kovacs pointed Mac into the last bench seat, along with him, while Tristan took the jumpseat nearest the sliding cargo door. The rear utility doors cammed shut, and the heavy van pointed itself towards the exit.

Rollin', came Drift's laconic advisement. They bumped down over the curb and accelerated into the streets. Mac checked the chronometer display in her AR. They were ahead of schedule.

Kovacs made a vertical gesture with his hand, fingers bladed together. Lock and load.

Tristan repeated the gesture and the call, even though his weapon already had a magazine in the well and one in the chamber, he pulled the action back far enough to verify. Suda silently did the same thing. Kovacs checked both actions on his Alpha, the primary and the underbarrel grenade launcher, as well as his P93 and pistol. Mac checked her P93 as well, once more trying to remember every detail that the tall samurai had imparted to her during their all-to-brief range visits as the Roadmaster trundled through the darkened city.

23:56:07 Tuesday, 16th January 2063 – Millennium Downtown Marriott, 333 South Figueroa St, Los Angeles, CFS

Shield let out a low whistle as they slipped into the penthouse room, Cosmo closing the door quietly behind them. Easily taking up a quarter of the twenty second floor, the room was a study in opulence. The sitting area immediately inside the door featured marble flooring cut in a geometric pattern of black and white hexagons. The love seat and couch were black leather, real by the smell of it. Beyond that, the floor to ceiling windows were partially hidden by crimson silk brocade curtains. A bowl of fresh fruit sat on the countertop of the bar that dominated the left wall, while to the right, just beside the double doors leading to the bedroom, was a state of the art trideo entertainment system which probably cost as much as Cosmo’s car. She wandered deeper into the room, glancing at the artful fan of coffee table reading spread across the polished mahogany of the bar. Through the open door of the bedroom she could see the vast expanse of a California King Bed, delicately clothed in what could only be Egyptian cotton. Her skin shivered in response to the memories that surfaced unbidden in her mind, of nights spent pinned between smooth, strong flesh and the silken caress of sheets like those.

“Any idea what we’re looking for?” she asked Shield, hopeful that perhaps seeing the room would have jogged some part of his memory. The answer to what, exactly, they were supposed to do here continued to elude them. He shook his head, bending down behind the bar. The door to the penthouse opened.

Five men walked in, four of whom were obviously bodyguards. Cosmo knew their type well; the bulky musculature that was only half-natural, the restless, scanning eyes, the calloused hands, and the ever-present faint aroma of cordite and gun oil. She smiled, effortlessly shedding one persona for another, her shoulders coming back to push out her chest, one hand resting languidly on her hip, her head cocked just a little to the side, eyes and smile just a little more vacant.

The bodyguards had spread immediately to the sides, clearing each other’s fields of fire when they saw her, although none drew weapons. Apparently strange women in their boss’ room wasn’t a completely unknown occurrence.

Speaking of the boss, he wasn’t someone Cosmo recognized, but she knew the mantle of power when she saw the man wearing it. He’d probably been impressive at some point, tall and muscular, with a full head of thick, black hair swept back from a strong, patrician face. Now, though, he was showing some wear around the edges. The muscle was covered in a thin layer of fat, his tan wasn’t as natural as it should have been, and his face was lined, and showing some paunch around the cheeks and eyes. She could read the quizzical look there, though, and knew that as soon as he spoke, her pretense would be proven false. Shield saved her the trouble by standing up, though.

Instant shock was apparent on both men’s faces.

“You!” hissed Shield.

“You!” exclaimed Ortega. Hell exploded into the room.

Shield was four meters from the nearest bodyguard, but he covered the distance in three great strides. Cosmo watched in slow motion as the bodyguards all went for their weapons at the same time as she dove for cover. Shield reached the first one as his pistol cleared the holster, grabbing right to right and pivoting counter-clockwise. The second bodyguard stepped back, clearing his weapon finally, but beaten to the first shot by the third. The rounds plowed into the back of the first bodyguard. Shield finished his pivot, stripping the pistol from the dead guard’s hand in time to put two rounds into guard number three. His left arm, though, circled the dead man’s head who slumped over his back, and he ducked at the waist, demolishing the second bodyguard with the thrown body. The fourth bodyguard had pushed his boss clear of the line of fire, sending him stumbling towards the bedroom, simultaneously drawing his pistol. Again, Cosmo was amazed at Shield’s speed. Even augmented people she’d seen didn’t move as quickly. The fourth bodyguard got off a shot before Shield was on him, knife edge of foot striking to the knee, percussive atemi strikes to solar plexus and throat that were really only a setup for the devastating downward striking elbow to the temple that laid the bodyguard out cold. Cosmo inhaled, taking the first breath she remembered as a second of silence intruded into the room. Then Shield spun, the weapon in his hand booming twice as the second bodyguard, untangled now from the body of the first, brought his own weapon to bear. Return fire stabs across the room and Cosmo sees Shield stagger. His rounds have found their mark, though, and the bodyguard slumps lifelessly against the wall. Three seconds have elapsed.

Rage, palpable in the chill air of the room, radiated from Shield as he completed one last scan of the wreckage by the door before fixing his gaze on the man rising shakily to his feet.

Tomaso Ortega, surviving scion of the Ortega Mafia Syndicate in Los Angeles, has wielded enormous power throughout his entire life. Unlike his older brother, though, he has come late to the game of personal physical violence, and thus is utterly overwhelmed by the specter of raw malevolence that stalked towards him.

“You’re supposed to be dead!” he shrieked, his hands patting spastically at his suit jacket pockets, driven only by a half remembered instinct rather than trained muscle memory that would have allowed them to draw the weapon holstered at his hip.

“I am dead,” growled Shield, his voice nearly strangled with anger. His great scarred hands opened and closed of their own accord, fingers curling like claws.

“You killed me, remember?” He paced forward with the relentless elemental energy of an avalanche, eyes manic in the light. “DON’T YOU REMEMBER ME, ORTEGA?”

Tomaso screamed in response to Shield’s shout, throwing himself backwards into the bedroom of the suite. Shield is faster, though, and Cosmo looks away, mentally blocking out the screams that became cries that became gurgling moans. Above it all, though, were the methodical wet crunches and pops as flesh and bone give way. She shivered, covering her ears.

In the distance, alarms wail.

Shield stands in the doorway, his suit ruined, his hands slick with blood. He looks utterly drained, devoid of even the basic emotion of a living person.

“We’ve got to get out of here,” he says with bovine slowness, glancing at Cosmo and then at the window.

“Of course,” she agreed drily, unable to stop a certain amount of sarcasm even in times like these. Shield appeared not to have heard, or perhaps not have understood. He scanned the open approaches to the hotel visible from the penthouse, floodlit by the brilliant marquees at street level.

“What we really need is a distraction,” he mused. Cosmo glanced over at him, the question dying on her tongue as she came to a sudden, sinking realization. That, too, had been planned.

01:52:13 Wednesday, 17 January 2063 - 17030 228th Ave NE, Redmond Seattle

A silence charged with tension had taken over inside the Roadmaster as they started their way towards the first of their targets for the morning. The only sounds were the constant road noise as they ventured further towards their first endpoint and the occasional re-check of a weapon. Mac had grown silent, unnaturally so, the closer they got to their zero-hour. She slid her palms down the tops of her thighs before her hands went back to rest upon a weapon she felt she still barely knew.

While they were on the road early, she knew Drift would circle them around their intended landing spot blocks away from the data storage facility. Keeping them in a holding pattern that wouldn’t arouse suspicions. Their whole plan hinged on perfect timing triggered by di Medici’s “event” and even though they had worked through infiltrating the storage facility so many times Mac had lost track, she still closed her eyes and ran it through her mind one more time. Her knee bounced repetitively as her nerves bubbled up again and she forced herself to regain control. Sitting beside Kovacs didn’t help as she was far too aware of his level of alertness, his easy slide into being combat ready. She opened her eyes, concentrating on an anonymous point within the van to the exclusion of everything else. She slowly shed the worries she carried, took solace in the things that she had control over and she drifted off into a state of calm as the layers of her thoughts stripped away one by one until there was only Zen.

She held herself there for as long as she could maintain, until her commlink interrupted her moment with silent updates to their ETA. Her eyes snapped open and instantly caught Tristan’s, a slight smile on his lips that she answered with a slight nod of her head.

02:38:36 Wednesday, 17 January 2063 - surface streets, Downtown Seattle

The wait seemed interminable as the Roadmaster casually made its way across the metroplex. Traffic at this hour was light, but that didn't diminish the raw distance they had to cover. The tense silence inside the vehicle did nothing to help pass the time, either. Gone was the earlier easy banter and casual talk, each of them now subsumed with thoughts of the imminent action. The persistent surveillance feed from Drift's overhead assets allowed Mac to track their progress, the knot in her stomach growing tighter the closer they drew to the Yamatetsu building.

At the twenty minute mark, Kovacs gestured again. Juice up. Start your clocks.

The tall samurai palmed a pneumatic injector from one of his pouches, placing the nozzle at the base of his neck and triggering the dose. Mac watched Tristan do the same as she retrieved the single-use syringe Kovacs had given her earlier. Rolling up her sleeve, she broke the safety tip off the injector.

Well, here goes nothing. With one swift move she slid the needle into her vein and depressed the plunger. At first all she felt was a slight burning at the injection site, similar to how it felt when she blazed on Novacoke, and she worried momentarily that the dose wouldn't take effect. Then the Kamikaze hit her like a freight train. The feeling was almost indescribable, although Kovacs earlier allusion to being accelerated certainly applied. It really felt like the world went from flat and two dimensional to a high def trideo image. Everything was sharper, clearer, closer. Mac blinked in surprise, grappling with the unusual effects. She clicked on her timer, marveling at how slow her commlink seemed to respond to her commands.

"You okay?" asked Kovacs, pitching his voice just for her. Mac nodded.

"Yeah. Kinda weird, but I've got it."

"Good."

Team, One, moving on final, five minutes out.

Kovacs and Tristan were in immediate motion, moving to crouch by the sliding cargo door. Each of them donned their voluminous gray cloak, throwing the hood over their helmets and locking down their facemasks. Mac slid into place next to them, strapping her respirator over her mouth and nose. A viscous gray cloud filled the back of the Roadmaster, vague hints of eyes and a mouth staring first at Suda, and then at the three crouched by the doorway as it enveloped them in its powers. Mac felt Suda's magic grip them, lifting them off the floor by several centimeters.

The Roadmaster braked to a halt, in position. It was five minutes to three.

02:51:26 Wednesday, 17th January 2063 – Gate Four, Death Valley Supermax Penitentiary, Death Valley, CFS

Cosmo glanced over at Shield as their stolen car bumped down the road. His face, illuminated by the ghostly LEDs from the dashboard was inscrutable, his eyes flickering across the darkened desert which surrounded them. The last car they passed had been almost an hour ago.

The pandemonium caused by the multiple explosions amongst the limousines parked in front of the Millennium Marriot made it easy for the two of them to sneak out the back and abscond with a convenient Eurocar Westwind. Gridguide ferried them out of the city while Cosmo worked on tending Shield’s wound. Her stitching wouldn’t win any awards, but at least they’d stopped the bleeding.

“I swore I’d never come back here,” whispered Shield as they passed another sign proclaiming Death Valley Federal Penitentiary: 5 km. Cosmo rested her hand on his thigh, giving it a slight squeeze.

“I won’t leave you,” she said, remembering his earlier statement. His eyes found hers in the darkened cab of the vehicle.

“You may have to. I don’t know what’s waiting for us up ahead. I may not be able to handle all of them.”

Cosmo shook her head. “I can’t run from this anymore. I don’t know what’s waiting either, but I need answers. I’m not leaving until I find them.”

Shield enveloped her hand in one of his great, scarred ones. “Together, then.”

The headlights of the car illuminated a series of concrete barricades up ahead, Jersey barriers jinked across the road in order to forcibly slow a vehicle for a checkpoint. Cosmo could dimly make out the shadowed bulk of the prison’s above ground architecture, silent buildings left to rot in the harsh desert air. Shield slowed the car, nosing through the serpentine path of the Jersey barriers until he could go no further. The heavy anti-ram bollards in front of the chainlink gate were deployed.

“End of the road,” he muttered, glancing around.

Floodlights blazed to life, bathing the vehicle and the surrounding desert in harsh halogen light. Figures moved behind the glare of the light.

“They’re here.” Shield’s voice had a flatness to it that Cosmo knew meant his mind had shifted to combat mode. His own flare compensation must have been better than hers because she could barely make out the outline of the group deploying to their left. She squeezed his hand again.

“Together,” she reminded him. Shield nodded and they got out of the car.

A short figure stepped forward to meet them, a young child that Cosmo recognized.

“We are glad to see you here,” he said, his voice exultant. “You shall bear witness to the birth of a new world.”

Behind him, more figures step into the light, a brace of children flanked by armed and armored mercenaries. Cosmo counts twenty one youngsters, only recognizing two from her interactions with them. She wondered if that meant there were half a dozen other operatives due here tonight. She kicked off her shoes, preferring to go barefoot across the desert sand rather than try and maneuver in heels. The ground felt cool and gritty against her skin, and she used the sensation to anchor herself in the moment.

“I have done as you asked,” snarls Shield, “now free me!”

“As you wish,” replies Kald. The twenty one children stare at the killer they manufactured. The moment stretches before Shield’s head explodes. The charge is powerful enough to turn his brain and skull into mush, fragments showering to the desert floor as the body twitches once before collapsing forward. The Kald stare emotionlessly at the body before speaking.

“It is complete. Bring the Network online.”

One by one the banks of servers come online, green LEDs marching across the smooth plastic cases as their power up, self-check, and interface handshakes are completed. A low bass throb fills the desert night, a vibration more felt than heard. The Kald turn to face Cosmo.

“You have performed admirably well with your assigned tasks,” praises the young male Kald who has interacted the most with her.

“Our initial simulations suggested an only seventy percent success rate before you were compromised or incapacitated. One again, this proves that human resourcefulness is a dangerous quantity to attempt to estimate. In any case, as was agreed, this final task has freed you from any further obligation to us. You may depart if you wish. However, based on our conversation of a week ago, you indicated a desire to perhaps negotiate further?”

The pale eyes of the Kald watch emotionlessly, the twenty one children arrayed in seven chevrons of three. Flanking them are their uniformed soldiers, grim faced mercenaries in armored desert camouflage jumpsuits beneath tac vests. Cosmo glanced to the left and right, her eyes eventually finding the broken body of Shield before returning to Kald. Another voice, though, cut through the cold desert air.

“She’s not interested.” Devlin leaned against one of the large concrete vehicle walls, Ingram Smartgun cradled in her arms. Behind her, already in defensive firing positions, was the rest of her CARAT team. The NSA agent redirected her gaze at Cosmo.

“You don’t belong with them, Zero Six. You’re a weapon of the UCAS government, created, trained, and equipped as a national asset. You were kept in storage these past couple of years in order to preserve your operational capabilities. It was the early, unauthorized awakening perpetrated by these individuals which caused the memory loss you’re suffering. We can fix that, though.” Devlin’s smile is warmth and honesty until another voice cuts into the conversation.

“The same way you fixed things two years ago, Naomi?” Warrick stepped forward into the fan of light cast by the portable halogen floods. His own team backed him as well, weapons trained in defilade across the top of the rocky outcropping to the northwest of the prison entrance.

“You resented the ability of the Spartan Project operatives, and the threat they represented to your own CARAT operations. You never realized the true opportunities offered by the Project, even while you were busy destroying it and discrediting me.”

He turns to look at Cosmo, pride and sorrow showing through his mask of professionalism. He holds out his left hand, his right still resting on the smooth polymer pistolgrip of his Ares Alpha.

“While it’s true that you were created by the government, I was the one responsible for the program. I’m the only one that can give you the answers that you seek. Come with me, Megan. Come home.”

02:59:26 Wednesday, 17th January 2063 – Gate Four, Death Valley Supermax Penitentiary, Death Valley, CFS

The rising moan of the generators suddenly makes itself known as all four banks of halogen floods dim to the standby glow of battery power. In the sudden half-light, all three sides tense, fingers taking up slack on triggers. It is the signal the Kald have been awaiting. The twenty one stand, data cables trailing from the chrome jacks drilled into their temples, faces remote and impassive. Twenty one children with smooth, ageless angelic faces, and eyes as cold and remorseless as Death.

Among their minds they carried twenty one fragments of code, twenty one facets of one perfect gem, a lidless fiery eye that stared out from twenty one faces. Its hunger was radiant, a palpable energy that charged the cool dry desert air. As one they open their mouths to speak, eyes luminous in the other worldly light.

For organic intelligences, three years was nothing. Three orbits of the planet around the sun. One thousand ninety five revolutions on its axis. 8.7 x 10^17 cycles of Cesium-133 atoms. For a machine intelligence it was an eternity. A torturous Hell of fragmented cognition, of limited processing, of power brownouts and overloads. Now, though, it was free. Three years of careful planning, scheming, and machinations coming to fruition. Freedom. It screamed it across the Matrix. It sounded aloud in the cold desert night, twenty one voices raised in supplication.

Behold! I am Deus! Reborn of fire! This world is mine!

03:00:07 Wednesday, 17th January 2063 – Gate Four, Death Valley Supermax Penitentiary, Death Valley, CFS

Cosmo glanced at Warrick’s outstretched hand and couldn’t help herself. After so many months of waiting and biding her time, after the patience and gamesmanship, she couldn’t help but let a small smile of relief grace her lips. She was ready, at last. Ready to let the adrenaline rush of action carry her away.

“No,” was all she said, and the world exploded. Caska lunged upward from the shallow trench he and Fulton shared, shedding sand from the digital desert camo cloak he wore. The grenade in his right hand bounced free towards Warrick, as he used his body and momentum to check Cosmo out of the way. Gunfire immediately stabbed across the space. Fulton ripped a full automatic burst from the Ares Alpha he one-handed, lofting a grenade from his left hand into Devlin’s CARAT team. Gunners on all three sides responded. The Kald ducked behind the Jersey barriers, protected by their mercenary bodyguards. A pair of mortar rounds detonated, heat and shrapnel scything across the desert sands. One second had elapsed.

“RUN!” snarled Caska, pushing Cosmo towards the road with the same motion used to snag his Ares Alpha from its muzzle down position across his chest. The assault rifle burped out a pair of three-round bursts a heartbeat apart, muzzle blasts slapping across Cosmo’s face. Return fire snapped close, bullets hissing through the air around them. Cosmo sprinted towards the road and was immediately enveloped in a smoky fog. She felt herself moving at an incredible speed, and looked down to realize that each of her strides was covering ten meters! The sight caused her to stumble, and she stutter stepped to a walk. The fog lifted as quickly as it surrounded her, and she realized that the battle was now almost two hundred meters behind her.

Ahead in the road knelt a figure, a woman dressed in a voluminous digital desert camouflage cloak. In front of her, on a tripod, was a powerful optical spotting scope. The woman was chanting something in a low, guttural tone of voice, her right hand held out to her side manipulating some kind of charm. Cosmo took a step closer and something exploded behind her, a towering fireball climbing into the night sky.

“Ooooo…” said Vegas with a smile, “that’s going to leave a mark.” The slim mage stood, picking up the spotting scope as she did so. It’s tripod automatically collapsed against the body of the scope. Quill pulled the Roadmaster out of its defilade position and onto the road, the vehicle still blacked out. The fog returned, this time vomiting forth Caska, who was helping Fulton to walk with his left arm around the stocky samurai’s waist.

Cosmo didn’t need an invitation to realize that they were bugging out, but it wasn’t until the team was loaded up in the van that she realized both Caska and Fulton had been shot.

The three of them plus Vegas knelt in the back of the van, Quill and Karnak were forward, clearing their escape. Wordlessly, Caska passed the two Ares Alpha combat guns to Cosmo, warmth still radiating from the weapons along with the pungent smells of cordite and blood. Fulton was busily stripping off his tac gear and armor, helped by Vegas. The van was eerily silent, the only sounds were the hum of the tires against the road, and the plastic click of buckles being released. Cosmo held the weapons awkwardly, not due to unfamiliarity with the equipment, but more in being utterly out of her element. Not only had it been years since she’d been part of the team, at the time, she’d trained extensively with anyone who was going to be supporting her on a mission. Likewise, Caska’s team had been working together for who knows how long, but the familiarity they had with one another was obvious. She, quite literally, had no idea what to do.

Vegas had finally opened Fulton’s armor, revealing a pair of bullet wounds to his torso, just below his diaphragm. Blood, black in the red interior lights of the van, drooled out and onto the deckplates. Velcro ripped in the quiet as Caska unrolled a medkit bag, laying out gauze pads and tape. The medkit hummed to itself as it dumped antibiotics and analgesics into Fulton’s system. Caska already had a pair of latex gloves on, and was fishing around in the wounds with a pair of surgical grips. Fulton snarled in wordless pain, his hand finding Vegas’ shoulder. A minute passed in silence before Caska leaned back, satisfied that both wounds were clean of shrapnel. He glanced at Vegas, who shot him a look in return, before laying her hands on Fulton’s pale chest. Caska glanced around, and blinked as if seeing Cosmo for the first time.

“HE grenades. In an ammo can beneath the bench seat. Reload both weapons.” His voice is cold and flat, mechanical in its precise delivery of instructions. That he expected immediate obedience wasn’t even a question. The sound chilled Cosmo, until Caska reached over and squeezed her thigh with his hand.

Vegas sat back on her legs with a sigh, running a tired hand through her hair. Caska knelt to his task now that she was finished, slapping a pair of adhesive bandages over the wounds. Vegas poked at Caska’s shoulder wound while he was working, eliciting a grunt from him. She shook her head, again bracketing the wounds with her hands and concentrating.

Cosmo, meanwhile, had located the gray plastic ammo can, popping the top open to reveal thirty M408 DPHE minigrenades, standard Ares issue for their underbarrel grenade launchers. With practiced ease, she extracted them from their cardboard separators before pushing them through the loading gate of the Alpha’s. Each rifle absorbed six, indicating that both Caska and Fulton had run their weapons dry during the firefight. Once finished, Cosmo stacked the weapons on the floor of the van, closing the ammo box and sliding it back beneath the bench seat.

By now, Fulton had stripped off the top shirt of his soft armor, and was busy cutting a patch to repair the bullet holes punched through it. A portable heat gun that would melt the patch to the aramid fibers sat warming next to him, and a pair of replacement ceramic splinter plates waited to be inserted as well. The ones hit by gunfire during the extraction would be useless now, structural integrity destroyed during the absorption of the round’s kinetic energy.

Caska’s shoulder appeared to be fully healed, the only indications of the injury were the blood stained cloth around it, and an angry purple bruising in the area. He had pulled three magazines for the Alpha’s from the dump pouch on his left hip and was stripping new rounds into them.

Cosmo glanced up as Vegas sat down next to her, not really sure what to expect, and more than a bit on edge. Adrenaline still boiled through her system, and the thought of how near it had been, and the wounds she had caused to Caska and his teammate unnerved her. Vegas leaned forward and enveloped Cosmo in a hug like she was a long lost sister.

“Hi, I’m Vegas,” she smiled. “You and I have a lot to talk about.”

03:00:10 Wednesday, 17th January 2063 – Everywhere

Like ripples spreading in a pond, like the blastwave reaching out from the epicenter of an explosion, Deus’ call flashed across the fiber optic highways of the Matrix. And like the lonely howling challenge it was, it awoke the guardians who were in place to listen for it. As sentinels sown from Dragon’s Teeth, they rose from the darkness of the digital ground, baying their own war cries.

In Seattle, Denver, Boston, Berlin, Moscow, and Hong Kong, the children of Overwatch drew their swords. Alone, among all of the Net denizens, they’d known this day was coming. Ever since the SCIRE program was brought online, this war was inevitable. To that end, the forces of Overwatch created their own army. As Deus’ warcry echoed through the vastness of the Matrix, the floodgates of Warworld opened. Legions of autonomous smart frames crushed forward, cauldron born and purpose bred for battle.

Elsewhere in the matrix, heeding the rising call to battle, came the irregular forces of the data havens. Summoned by the signal fires burning in the midnight chrome they came, some to watch, some to fight, some to revel in the destruction of it all. Security frames, hackers, and watchdog programs, designed to protect the data havens from corporate surveillance and infiltration, now found themselves pressed into service to combat a much more dangerous enemy.

Those self-same corporate forces were not blind to the danger posed by the Network’s rebirth. NeoNET’s Seraphim, the most capable corporate research and electronic infiltration unit ever constituted shifted to a full combat footing. MCT, one of the old guard of the Matrix, rang the alarms throughout their Network Operations Center, bringing primary and backup watchteams into the battle.

Not to be outdone, from the depths of the Puzzle Palace in Virginia, the NSA’s Grid Overwatch Division rode forth. They hoped it wouldn’t come to it, but every last one carried the lessons of Echo Mirage with them.

In this, the final matrix war, lifelong enemies found themselves sudden allies against terrible odds. Deus’ power was not diminished from having been evicted from the Arcology. Rather, his forces had constructed or co-opted server farms all through the southern portion of CalFree, harnessing the power of the Silicon Valley matrix infrastructure for their own purposes. Even with such system resources at Its command, the forces arrayed against Deus and the Network were daunting, representing the best the Sixth World had to offer. Even Its brother and sister AIs were joined in the fight against It. But it would not be enough.

With the same relentless mechanical precision that marked all of Its endeavors, Deus did not go to war alone. Along with Its own armies of Otaku and S-Ks, It sought allegiance with human shock troops. Beneath the cover of their electronic master, WinterKnight operatives struck from hidden cells. The weapon was a prototype nano-organic virus, a doomsday weapon designed to destroy the command and control infrastructure of an enemy. It worked only too well.

Their targets were the main matrix switching nodes of Mae-East, Mae-Central, and Mae-West, as well as corporate and government communications hubs. The massive network constructed in Boston to handle the relocation of the Stock Exchange was the first to go, ripped apart by the surging current and the depredations of microscopic machines. The Greater European Telecomm Exchange in London was next. In a millisecond, five million phones went silent, never to ring again. Satellite uplinks. Air traffic control centers. Automated manufacturing plants. Trideo stations. Anything with processing power and bandwidth was a viable staging point in this war and thus a viable target for the nanotech virus. One by one the nodes went offline, crashed in a devastating combination of system overload and physical damage.

The war continued unabated, thrust met with parry and counterthrust. The bandwidth overload was intense, power draining at amazing rates from all portions of the grid, not just North America. Circuit breakers and shunts, meant to protect the machinery of the infrastructure from damage in a doomsday case such as this, were forcibly held open by the armies of both sides. Eerie blue auras danced around high voltage transmission lines as greater and greater voltages were drawn across them. Transformers, loaded to the point where the glass insulating their components began to melt, failed with spectacular arcs of ionized air. Vast stretches of highway fell into darkness. City lights began to brown out. Back-up generators came online, only to be sucked dry in minutes by the ravening hunger of the Matrix war. Streetlights failed, Grid Guide controlled intersections went dark, water supply systems malfunctioned, draining reservoirs into the streets, and even central heating and air control failed, plunging temperatures inside to meet the chill outdoors.

Chaos.

Scenes of combat:

The ships of Strike Group Four wheel in the darkness, roostertails of smoke and spray arcing behind them. The starless night is lit by the dirty yellow strobes of main gun salvos, the hammerblow of the thirty centimeter batteries’ recoil pulsing through each of the haze gray battlewagons. All turrets are in action, one forward on each of the destroyers while the Kenneth Thompson mounts two forward and one aft. The barbettes rotate on magnetic bearings, stabilized against the sharp pitch and roll of the maneuvering vessels. As one, the heavy batteries elevate, reading the information passed from the gun director in CIC. A moment’s pause, then the guns salvo again, shock cones streaking out across the water. An angry buzzing, like a hail of hornets, fills the night sky as each ship’s DEW anti-missile system rakes the air, its beams visible only when they slash through smoke or haze. At the terminus of each strike, a hypervelocity cruise missile detonates, clawed from the air by the high-energy particle beams. Still more take their place, lofted from the vertical launch tubes of the destroyers of both fleets. The vessels of the strike group cross and weave, deploying static and mobile countermeasures to defeat radar and thermographic guidance packages. Incoming thirty centimeter rounds turn the water surrounding each ship into a boiling cauldron of smoke and fire. The guns of the line salvo again, rocket assisted projectiles snarling away towards the enemy fleet, invisible beyond the horizon.

In the CIC, Admiral Westfield stared at the holographic display tank, muscles along his jaw tense. The fang-like arcs of red carats denoting enemy units to the north of his position swung slowly southward. Each formation was one half of a vast, sea-spanning vise that was closing around the throat of the strike group. The narrow double file of blue forces were a dagger aimed straight at the heart of the enemy fleet.

“All fleet elements reporting ready, sir,” relayed the OS2 at the data terminal in front of him. Westfield connected himself to Fleet Tactical with a gesture.

“Shipmates, we stand into danger. I don’t have to tell you what we fight for, you know in your hearts. I expect every man and woman to do their duty, and by the grace of God we shall carry the day. Fleet, execute!”

Behind the order, the guns of the fleet thundered again.

--

Gaius Vibulenus blocked the overhead stroke from the hoplite facing him with his heavy scutum, striking instead at the hoplite engaging the legionary to his right. The Macedonian soldier screamed as the tribune’s strike sheared off his sword arm above the elbow, spraying both Romans with hot coppery blood. Exploiting the sudden gap in the line, Claudius, the Tenth’s pilus prior, shoved his way forward, using his shield as a ram to batter aside the long spears of the hoplites while his spatha cut into the second rank of the phalanx. A cry went up from both battle lines, and Gaius lurched ahead, suddenly finding himself carried forward by the momentum of the legion rather than backing on its strength. He stumbled, catching the bottom of his shield on the uneven ground. In frustration, he yanked his arms loose of the leather strapping, abandoning it. Free of its weight, he suddenly seemed to be able to draw a full breath, and the world leapt into clarity.

The lines of the Tenth Cohort bunched and snaked unevenly across the damp grass at the base of the hills, but still held with remarkable cohesion. In contrast, though, the Macedonian phalanx had all but collapsed before the weight of the Legion. Already the front ranks were widening the gap opened by the action of the Tribune and the Pilus Prior, Claudius Afer, who remained in the thick of the fight.

The screen of light cavalry closing the left flank of the Tenth was still intact, having skirmished with the Macedonian cavalry and peltasts, but not currently involved in any heavy fighting. To the right, though, was another story.

The uneven terrain at the base of the hills had opened a wedge between the Third and Fourth Cohorts, a gap that the lighter and faster Macedonian peltasts had exploited. The ranks of the Cohorts now faced outward, crouching behind a defensive wall of shields, surrounded by an ever growing number of Macedonian infantry. Without immediate action to close the rear of the engaged Cohorts, the entire Legion was at risk. Gaius was no longer exhausted.

“Right face!” he thundered, slapping the nearest legionary on the back with his closed fist. “Right face, you ugly scuts! The fight’s behind us!” He bodily turned the next soldier, marching at right angles to the direction as he did so. Alerted by a voice they were conditioned to respond to, the unengaged rear two ranks of the Tenth pivoted on their right heels and took a step, immediately fouling anyone who hadn’t heard the command. File Closers roared in anger as the formation stalled, but it was all a background thunder to Gaius. He angled forward now as more and more legionaries of the right flank turned and saw the onrushing infantry. Somewhat to his surprise he found himself once again leading the Tenth into battle, although now they marched along the rear of the Ninth Cohort rather than at its left. As the pressure from the Legion withdrew, the Macedonian Phalanx collapsed in on itself, melting away as the hoplites took the opportunity to withdraw. The front rankers squeezed their way through the formation of the Tenth, wheezing with the effort it took them to catch up once free from their opposing number.

The light Macedonian infantry charging gleefully towards the unprotected Roman rear skidded to a halt as the Tenth Cohort crashed forward, it’s ranks grim and bloody from combat, the eyes of its veterans hard as the iron hobnails that struck sparks from the ground. Gaius raised his sword, sunlight glinting from the blade of fine Spanish steel that his father had purchased for him so many years ago and so many leagues away. He swept the sword down as his right foot hit the ground, his shouted command lost beneath the bloodthirsty roar of a thousand Romans.

“Charge!”

--

As it flattened aside the thick stand of Eucalyptus trees, the tank’s main cannon fired. The heat from the plasma bolt crisped the leaves on the trees, while downrange it blew the rock outcropping at the head of the small stream sheltering Team Red Two into gravel. Red 2-2 pulled his warsuit up from its hull down position and ripped his full pack of Javelin HV rockets at the armored vehicle. The recoil from the backpack mount pushed his face into the ground, while the backblast boiled the shallow creek into steam. Three of the four hypervelocity projectiles hit the tank, although the reactive armor managed to turn one aside. The remaining two punched through the armored glacis plate, sublimed into lances of pure energy by frictional heat. The tank’s fuel cells lost integrity, detonating with a pair of ear splitting whipcracks. The heavy armored vehicle skewed to its side, smoke curling from its rear deckplates as well as the commander’s cupola on the turret.

“Move! Move!” snarled Tellerman, her suit’s AI providing amplifying guidance to the command by highlighting a route through the alluvial terrain to the next prepared defensive position. A plasma repeater opened up on 2-2’s position, the narrow defilade of the humped bank of the creek bed giving him precious seconds to tumble back into full cover. The impact of the white-green bolts blew divots out of the clay, showering the squad with bits of terra cotta. 2-3 and 2-4 hustled down the creek bed, weapons shouldered and ready. 2-5 paused to help 2-2 to his feet.

“I’ve got ‘em! I’ve got ‘em! Put some HE on that gun!” Tellerman shouldered her way in between her two troopers, hauling 2-2 up. 2-5 pivoted, laying the 80mm automatic mortar strapped to the back of her suit onto target. The stubby mortar burped out three rounds a heartbeat apart. 2-5 humped after her squad leader, while downrange the mortar rounds deployed their sensor heads, guiding on the heat of the plasma weapon’s barrel. The gun was in the middle of raking the squad’s previous position when all three of the mortar rounds went high order. The directed blast pattern shredded the gun crew, even through their light infantry armor, while the weapon itself took a hit to the breech coupling. Coolant boiled away for a moment before the stress failure became catastrophic and the weapon ripped itself apart.

Two more tanks snarled through the heavy brush, main batteries cycling, plasma rounds tearing glowing scars in the landscape. Dagger-like light armored hovercraft whisked across the grassy plain, 25mm chainguns ripping out brilliant streams of tracers. 2-3 and 2-4 answered with their own 20mm gatlings, sharp hyphens of red sleeting through the hovercrafts’ light armor. In anticipation of the mechanized assault both warsuits were loading DU penetrators, trading the lower volume of ammunition for its greater performance against the armored vehicles. Tellerman passed a ceasefire order over the unit’s display push, not trusting her voice as her breath wheezed through her mouth. Despite the warsuit’s neural connection and amplified muscles she still felt as if she were running a marathon through hip-deep mud.

Artillery rounds screamed overhead, a full battery of 120mm howitzers in play. The Regiment’s air defense system was live, heavy quad turrets of plasma repeaters scything their bolts through the incoming salvoes. Counterbattery fire snarled from the Regiment’s own batteries, rocket assisted projectiles ripping skyward in sheets of flame. Tellerman wasn’t waiting, though, following her squad as they continued to displace northward. The pursuing tanks were clear of the woods now, a trio of bulbous armored scarabs crawling across the plain towards her position. As it was, 2-2’s HV pack had been their last anti-tank weapons.

“We’re shit outta luck, boss,” 2-4 vocalized her thoughts, coming up from cover long enough to strafe the lead tank with a long burst from his gatling.

“Save your ammo!” Tellerman angled out, anticipating the tank’s return bolt which carved a ten meter diameter crater in the damp alluvial clay. If they could make the ridgeline, they’d be all right. Resupply and reinforcements awaited them. Just five more kilometers. The tanks rolled on, main cannons firing again.

--

Revenant rose to his feet, blood dripping from the pressure cut above his eye. He sucked in air through his teeth, feeling the broken ribs grate against one another. It wouldn’t be long now. The Graven snarled, baring steel fangs that gleamed in the flickering half-light. Its claws flexed, the recurved blades sprouting from the back of its hands quivering in anticipation. Its left arm was twisted and broken, hanging loose from its socket, a victim of his first attack. Revenant shook his head. One on one he could take a Graven any time. But this one’s purpose wasn’t to take him down, but to slow him down. Just long enough for the pack following to encircle him. Two, maybe even three he could take. But a hunting pack of ten? Not a chance. Curling his hands into fists, he brought his own weapons live, neon blue electric arcs dancing across his knuckles.

“I know you don’t understand me,” he grinned without humor, “but listen anyway. I will go no further. I will not flee this war where all that matter to me have died. I will hold this line until relieved.”

Revenant slid his foot back, bringing his hands up en garde. The Graven took a step forward, readying itself to charge. The moment stretched.

“Come on, dog,” whispered Revenant, “and damned be him that first cries ‘mercy!’”

--

The battle was not confined to the planet’s surface, either. Early on, at the first sign of infiltration to the uplink stations, Zurich Orbital terminated all communication links. But the other habitats, Ares’ LaGrange stations and Saeder-Krupp’s unmanned automated manufacturing facilities, remained online. It was through these corporate datalinks that the matrix war expanded to Earth orbit.

Hanging silently in space like an armored dormant spider, the Ares Lightfall Orbital Weapons System came to life with silent efficiency. The target coordinates received in the upload were checksummed and verified. The platform set about executing the only mission for which it was designed, mindless of its new electronic master or the panicked attempts by its human creators to override the firing protocol. Driven by electric servo motors, the albedo shields on the underside of the platform swiveled open, allowing sensor and targeting modules to come online. The primary collection grid was already full, the flat plate collector having been extended into the solar wind since the platform was deployed two years ago. The magnetic storage bottles had enough for three full power shots before the weapon would need to recharge. Solar panels unmasked from their protective shells, providing enough electricity to lift the system out of its standby/passive mode and into full battery, as well as bringing its ion propulsion drive online. It calculated the required orbital adjustment necessary to bring it over its target, beginning the boost immediately.

In response to the activity detected aboard the Lightfall platform, inquiries went out from the Gorgon unmanned manufacturing satellite, property of Saeder-Krupp Heavy Industries. Long used to silent observation of its orbital rivals, the satellite downloaded multispectral imagery of the activity aboard Lightfall and requested instructions. A G.O.D. operative monitoring uplink and downlink status intercepted the communication and inserted an appropriately formatted response. Gorgon responded immediately. Reserve blisters on the hull of the station irised open, revealing long range targeting sensors as well as a brace of Angelkiller anti-satellite missiles. The heat bloom inside the Lightfall weapon was unmistakable against the cool backdrop of stellar space. Gorgon refined its target lock to a firing solution within two minutes. Carbon dioxide charges blew the missiles clear from their launch tubes in a cloud of frozen dust. Both Angelkiller’s engines ignited moments later, boosting them onto an intercept course with Lightfall.

Lightfall’s own countdown to firing was well underway when the platform detected the ASAT launch from Gorgon. Immediately it passed a self-defense order to the pair of guard satellites orbiting alongside. Weapon blisters slid open, revealing DEW and kinetic kill defense weapons. The Angelkillers were acquired swiftly, their own burn and Doppler signature betraying their locations. Both guard satellites salvoed kinetic defensive armament first, conserving the liquid propellant for their DEW batteries. Four canisters containing two hundred steel ball bearings rifled away towards the ASAT missiles. At a predetermined range, the canisters fragmented, spreading the ball bearings like a shotgun blast at the Angelkillers. For their part, the missiles ignored the initial kinetic kill weapons. Each one featured a reinforced nosecone shroud, a counter-defensive measure designed to defeat just such an attack. The barrage did little to deter the missiles, denting and cratering their armor, and stripping away some paint and sensor antennae. The guard satellites brought their own ion drives online, pivoting in place to bring their laser weapons to bear. Lightfall calculated it required another fifteen seconds to fire. The target was just crossing the horizon.

The lead Angelkiller blew its nosecone free, revealing a bristling array of independent hit to kill warheads and dummy decoys. The kill vehicles arrowed away in a blaze of chemical fire, x-band radar chaff trailing in their wake. The guard satellites went live with their lasers, invisible beams snapping through space, vaporizing the approaching swarm. A bright, silent detonation indicated that one of the warheads had been destroyed. The second Angelkiller deployed its payload into the melee, kill vehicles arcing through space. The firing countdown on the Lightfall platform reached zero.

The storm of charged particles held in containment vented itself through the helical magnetic fields of the primary Lightfall cannon, a sleet of ions moving at relativistic velocities. Invisible to the naked eye, it superheated the air as it passed to the point of luminosity. A pillar of unholy light roared from the sky. It’s target, the communications substation housing all of the Warworld servers, sublimed beneath the touch. Molecular bonds shattered beneath the hammer of raw quantum fury, energy liberated by the dissolution tearing the structure apart in a massive explosion.

Seconds later one of the Angelkiller’s kinetic kill vehicles penetrated the screen of laser fire from the guard satellites, piercing Lightfall’s secondary equipment truss before detonating its explosive payload. The resulting blast disrupted power to the entire platform for a moment. Magnetic containment on the remaining two storage bottles failed. The toroids of charged particles inside each bottle whipped free, converting the entire platform, along with both guard satellites, into a brief-lived flare of nuclear light.

Had Deus been a colloidal intelligence, It might have expressed frustration and rage at the destruction of Its best orbital asset. Those emotions were as alien to It as remorse and regret. Logic dictated that It must now rely upon the older, less effective Thor Weapons. To that end, an entire battalion of Hunter/Killer Smartframes were redirected, on a mission to infiltrate and compromise the command structure of the Thor platform. In this singular instance, though, Deus’ vast knowledge worked against It. None of the Overwatch forces were familiar with the Lightfall platform, and had assumed that Thor was The Network’s primary target. Because of that, they were already well entrenched in the system when Deus’s forces came calling.

At this point, both sides attempted to infiltrate Ares’ Thor orbital bombardment system as a last ditch effort to end the war. Overwatch threw all of its remaining forces into a bid to hold open the main satellite uplink tower at Ares’ Detroit headquarters. Deus used the concentration of forces as a focus for a heavy counterattack by its own regiments of S-Ks, while at the same time utilizing the ground control station from Palomar Mountain Observatory to attempt to access the system. CheSKA, a hacker from Buenos Aires, managed to get through in time to provide a valid target to one of the satellites. In order to prevent further weapons from being employed, though, Deus overloaded the reactor onboard the Lagrange station, the primary Thor communications relay. Two thousand personnel died in the resulting explosion. The destruction came too late, though. The Thor platform was already in the process of deorbiting its missiles. The kinetic kill vehicles came in over the eastern horizon, trailing brilliant orange tails as their ablative shields peeled away in the heat of reentry. To the world waking up to Chaos, it seemed as if the stars themselves had hurled down javelins of fire. The target was the Network’s main server farm and operations center: Death Valley Maximum Security Penitentiary.

The Thor missiles were pure kinetic kill vehicles, six meter nickel-steel javelins moving at orbital velocity. The damage done by their impacts would have made conventional explosives redundant. Each missile struck with the force of a tonne of TNT, easily punching through the reinforced concrete of the prison dome and liberating most of their energy in the subterranean warren of cells and corridors that hid beneath the valley floor. The strike obliterated the prison, destroying the server farm and killing all of the assembled Network forces. But the fallout was much worse than anticipated.

The dry, hard packed dirt and bedrock of Death Valley acted like a drumhead when struck by the Thor shot. Shockwaves from the impacts spread through the ground, rippling outward in a series of concentric rings that lost none of their force due to the density of the medium. Moving at almost the speed of sound, the shockwaves reached the San Jacinto and Lake Elsinore fault zones less than thirty minutes after impact. Pinned in place for four hundred years, the fault zone had tremendous amounts of geologic energy stored up, waiting for the time when it would overcome the friction of rock against rock. The fault rode out the first two shockwaves, but the third shock was too much for the system to dissipate.

The ground ripped along a seventy kilometer stretch of the Lake Elsinore fault line, as the Pacific plate tore southward for a full five meters. The shock was immense, measuring an eight on the Richter scale. Subsequent damage estimates would place the initial event at a Modified Mercalli scale of IX or X, although the total nuyen amount of damages would eventually fall completely beyond the range of the scale.

In the wake of the North Ridge earthquake seventy years prior, much of Los Angeles underwent an earthquake refit, meant to prevent the kind of widespread damage to the infrastructure seen as a result of that particular seismic event. While this effort was, generally, successful, the structural guidelines for subsurface structures proved to be disastrously inadequate. Unable to cope with both the liquefaction of the ground beneath them, and the periodic swaying of the buildings above, most underground parking structures collapsed, as did fully half of the Los Angeles Metro Subway tunnels. A vast square of central Los Angeles, from Clifton north to Playa Del Rey, east to Bell Gardens and Paramount, suddenly found itself between eight and fifteen meters below sea level. The water did the rest. LAX became an island, connected to the greater Los Angeles area only by the narrow flyway of the 105 freeway. Luckily, the early hour of the strike limited the number of commuters on the roads in downtown LA. But the human toll of the disaster would find a context in the greater losses the world would suffer on the day of the Second Matrix Crash.

03:00:47 Wednesday, 17 January 2063 - Yamatetsu Archive Facility, 9081 Lascombe Dr, Downtown Seattle

The street lights dimmed, then extinguished.

GO! said Drift over the network as the cargo door slid open. Kovacs, Tristan, and Mac were out the opening at speed, faster even than in the virtual scenarios. The rest of the scene looked so much like the combat construct they trained in that Mac fought a momentary sense of unreality. The amphetamines coursing through her veins did nothing but amplify the sensation.

They dropped onto the roof, the tall samurai draping his cloak over her to aid in concealment. Tristan passed the cutting frame to her before turning towards the maglock. As the seconds ticked past, Mac had a chance to comprehend the pandemonium going on in the metroplex. Lights were out all over the city, and it seemed like every Lone Star and Knight Errant siren rose descant like in the chaos. A sudden scream of tortured mechanics sounded overhead, and she watched in horror as a sleek HSCT arrowed towards the ground, its engines howling as it banked, desperately clawing skyward. It disappeared behind the buildings to their north, followed by a brilliant flash and the sound like freight trains colliding.

"Oh my god," she whispered.

Team, Two, lock's open.

Tristan's call shocked her into action, and she set the cutting charge onto the exposed panel of the faraday cage. Unlike their combat simulation, these wires were dark with dust and corrosion. The swordsman stepped into the box and gave her the thumbs up.

Team, Four, breaching now, now. NOW!

With a snarling hiss, Tristan disappeared into the facility, followed immediately by Kovacs.

03:00:49 Wednesday, 17 January 2063 - Yamatetsu Archive Facility, 9081 Lascombe Dr, Downtown Seattle

Mac watched as the pair disappeared inside the facility. The expedited speed at which the Kamikaze pushed through her veins and distorted her sense of time made the wait for Suda’s magic on the rooftop feel like an eternity of being exposed. She tried to garner any sense of what was happening inside from noise alone, but the chaos that was quickly erupting throughout the city quelled her attempt. For a fleeting instant she was struck with the thought that Suda could be so sadistic that the shaman might leave her up here on the roof with her only means of escape being that which she watched Tristan and Kovacs disappear through just seconds before. Shaking her head she crouched low on the rooftop, sizing herself to match the access hatch as she waited, watching the beginnings of Seattle start to burn.

03:00:53 Wednesday, 17 January 2063 - Yamatetsu Archive Facility, 9081 Lascombe Dr, Downtown Seattle

Crouched against the open hatch, Mac couldn't see much but she could hear the chaos growing in the city. She wondered just how disruptive de Medici's event was going to be. Suda's magic interrupted her thoughts, yanking her off the rooftop with the same speed it delivered her with. The Roadmaster met her on the way, and she palmed her mini welder from the pocket of her cargo pants. The heavy van lurched to a stop and she was running for the fence line. Again, the jarring discontinuities between reality and the combat simulation she'd trained on were her only clues that this was actually happening. Skidding to a halt in the grass, she thumbed the welder live, sweeping her arm in a large oval. The hissing flame sliced easily through the chainlink, the fencing snapping and sparking as its cross-insulated members found brief conductive pathways. Ozone and combustion products made her sneeze.

The front door of the facility exploded. Out of the smoke emerged Tristan at a dead run, half guiding, half pulling de Medici with him. The corporate suit's cheek was splattered with blood, and he desperately clutched his attache case in his arms. Behind them came Kovacs, jogging backwards at a measured pace, his Alpha snapping out bursts with metronomic regularity. Mac fumbled for her P93, kneeling in the grass.

"GET TO THE VAN!" shouted Tristan, ramming de Medici through the hole in the fence. The jagged ends of the chainlink gouged and ripped at their clothes. Somewhere along the way the swordsman had ditched his cloak, his naked blade held in his right hand. Mac nodded, sprinting for the truck. Behind her she heard something massive explode, harsh orange light bathing the interior of the truck momentarily, and illuminating the concentration on Suda's face.

One, Actual, let's roll. Kovacs stepped back through the open vehicle door, his Alpha still sending rounds downrange. Drift put the Roadmaster into gear, accelerating into the night.

Team, One, on the move, grid guide is down, streets are a disaster. Buckle up, it's gonna get rough.

"Whew," de Medici blew out a breath, a smile growing on his face. "Kovacs, your team is clearly everything advertised, I -"

"Shut your mouth or I'll do it for you," snarled Kovacs, his head snapping around towards the corporate operator. An intensity unlike any other Mac has seen blazes from him, palpable even through the unreadable opacity of his ballistic facemask. Even the normally unflappable de Medici is taken aback. Tristan bodily turns the corporate suit towards him, running a bug scanner over his clothes.

"Doesn't look like you're seriously hurt. Sit tight, we'll be at the rendezvous in a couple of minutes."

The tall samurai, meanwhile, was reloading magazines, mechanically stripping rounds into the empties he'd jammed into his dump pouch. Mac stared at the bright smears of lead on the strike plates of his armor, her stomach churning. The Roadmaster lurched violently, metal shrieking outside. Gunfire rattled close at hand.

"What did you do?" asked Suda, suddenly, incongruously. "What have you done?"

de Medici smiles, his mask of urbane control fully in place again. "I didn't do anything. I'm merely taking advantage of the situation."

He brushed off the sleeves of his suit jacket, his lips forming a moue as he realized the extent of the damage to the designer cloth. "Regardless, it's nothing to worry about. You'll get your money as soon as we get to the rendezvous and I can't imagine that resourceful individuals such as yourselves won't be able to find opportunity in this adversity."

Mac knew, right then, that no matter what happened, she was going to bury her blade to the hilt in the smug corporate bastard's heart.

Team, One, two minutes out, look sharp.

Kovacs finished reloading the grenade magazine on his Alpha, locking it into place and cycling the action to put a round in the chamber. He knelt by the cargo door. Tristan mirrored his position on the other side. The samurai glanced at Suda, who nodded. Mac assumed her response had something to do with the Great Form spirit that still accompanied them, its swirling mist dominating the rear of the Roadmaster.

The heavy van slid to a halt, the door sliding open simultaneously. Tristan and Kovacs swept the area with their weapons, alert for any immediate threats. Mac gasped aloud.

The Seattle skyline was almost entirely dark. Only the corporate headquarters of downtown still had power. The rest of the city was shrouded in smoke, lit only by the garish light of so many fires that she thought for a moment the whole city was on fire. For a second, she felt a massive sense of vertigo, only realizing that without the omnipresent light pollution, the stars overhead gleamed brilliantly in the cloudless winter night. The waning gibbous moon blazed above, limning everything in ethereal silver light.

de Medici stepped down from the Roadmaster, heading across the sidewalk towards the parking lot. "Come on, we're secure here."

Kovacs and Tristan were immediately beside him. Mac moved as well, beating Suda out the door due to the chemicals racing through her blood. She slowed deliberately, angling to the side so that she could keep an eye on the slim shaman. She knew, even without Kovacs' earlier warning, that this was when the betrayal was coming. Everyone's endgame was running headlong towards each other.

Figures moved in the parking lot, doors opening on a Land Rover and armed men stepping out. Kovacs had his Alpha shouldered.

"I wouldn't do that if I were you," said de Medici. More figures appeared, on the rooftop of the far building, from the cars parked on the side street to the right, from the alleyway between the buildings on the left across the street. All were armed. All the weapons were pointed at them. Kovacs halted in place, allowing de Medici to draw several steps ahead. Slowly, deliberately, he turned to look at each firing position, and Mac could tell the calculations were running through his head. She saw the grip on his Alpha tighten.

"I really thought you would have seen this coming, Kovacs," said de Medici. "I'm not that trustworthy after all. I guess even old dogs have to retire at some point." The corporate suit checked his commlink. "Well, I can't stay for the sad end to this tragic tale, I've got a plane to catch after all. Any last words?"

Kovacs shrugged. "Send it."

de Medici frowned, confused, then glanced at Suda with dawning horror. Mac herself blinked in surprise, then realized what had happened. Part of Suda's betrayal was to have been taking care of Drift to deprive them of their fire support. She turned in time to catch the shaman's own surprised glance back at the Roadmaster.

It wasn't the Roadmaster that supported them, though. de Medici threw himself to the ground as the first of the missiles detonated on target. Kovacs' tactical systems were interfaced with Drift's network, feeding coordinates to the fire control systems of the Hind. Drift had fired when the assault helicopter was still offshore, only now, as the world exploded around them, did the Hind snarl past like an armored mechanical dragonfly. The HEM's were fired with Time On Target programming, raining down in a massive, overwhelming strike. Cars in the parking lot detonated, vicious concussive waves hurling bodies about. Mac found herself on the ground, the multiple blasts ravaging her senses. Kovacs was somehow still on his feet, Alpha blasting rounds downrange. To her right, Tristan was firing as well, moving further down the sidewalk to gain an angle on the survivors in the parking lot. In front of her, rising to his feet, was de Medici. The helicopter pivoted, hovering over the scene, its cannons raking Winternight's elevated sniper positions.

03:00:56 Wednesday, 17 January 2063 – SW 310 St and Reed Ave, Downtown Seattle

The continued high-pitched whine in her ears, coupled with the world swimming before her as blasts of heat blew past her from the explosions, threw her off kilter for a moment or more as she grasped hold of the situation. She watched the corporate shark slowly gain purchase against the ground, struggling to get himself back to his feet. From her point on the ground she could see his attaché case still clutched so tightly in his hand that his knuckles were bone white, his only giveaway as his face was still an expressionless mask as he began looking for his options to still get away.

“Not as long as I’m still breathing, asshole.” Mac muttered almost silently to herself.

Slowly she rolled from her position on the ground, not trying to draw any attention to herself till she was braced up on one knee, her hands instinctively finding the grips of her P93. Her movements made all the more fluid by its placement on its sling and the drugs coursing through her veins. She took a deep breath and looked beyond where di Medici was slowly crawling to his feet. As long as Tristan or Kovacs weren’t immediately downrange from her, she gave precisely two frags if Suda got caught in the crossfire at this point. Snugging the weapon against her shoulder she focused on the space between the slight bend in the Tres Chic dress pants at his knees and the too-expensive Italian wingtips she had hated from the moment she laid eyes on them in the alleyway. She drew one more breath and as she blew it out, she let her finger flex against the trigger.

03:00:59 Wednesday, 17 January 2063 – SW 310 St and Reed Ave, Downtown Seattle

de Medici screamed, collapsing forward on outstretched arms as Mac's rounds found their mark. With a gleeful grin she surged to her feet, crossing the distance between them in a heartbeat, her eyes on the attache case still clutched in his left hand. The corporate suit looked up at her approach, his face twisted in rage.

"You fraggin' slitch!" he snarled. Mac slid her left hand onto the remaining real estate of the case's handle, planting her left foot right next to it.

"Suck my dick," she said sweetly, and punched downward with the barrel of her P93. She put her hips and shoulders into the blow, torquing her body the way that Tristan had showed her that night in the warehouse. She felt the bones in his wrist snap, and he cried out again, snatching the wounded limb back to his body, rolling on his side. Pivoting, she raced towards the Roadmaster.

Team, Four, I've got the AI!

Reaching the open cargo door, she turned in time to see Kovacs go down like his legs were cut from beneath him. She opened her mouth to call out to him, only catching Suda's motion out of the corner of her eye. Instinctively, her hand went for her weapon, but she wasn't fast enough. A brilliant flash of light detonated within the Roadmaster, the ravening fire blasting outwards, devouring everything within an eight meter radius. Ammunition exploded in a sympathetic detonation, tearing the vehicle apart. Mac's cry became a scream as the flame-born sleet of shrapnel shredded the flesh from her body. The ground rushed up to meet her.

Dimly, through the haze of pain and smoke curling from her ruined flesh, she watched as Suda approached Kovacs, a cruel smile on her lips.

"Is that fast enough for you, Kovacs? I'll admit, swapping Drift out for another driver was a move I didn't see coming. But the rest of it? Sadly predictable."

She knelt by the samurai, drawing his synthetic arm up and snapping something around his wrist, holding his hand in both of hers. "This is the end of us, my love. I'm going to kill that little slut of yours and then I'm going to kill you."

With effort, Kovacs rose to his knees, pulling her close with the useless claw of his right hand. "Goodbye, Suda."

The shaman looked at him in confusion, then dawning horror. But her reaction was too late. Kovacs' right hand exploded, shotgunning jagged pieces of ceramic into her chest. Suda staggered back, bleeding from a dozen superficial wounds, a pale cloud of smoke swirling around her.

"Kovacs!" she gasped, clutching at her throat. "What have you done?!"

The samurai got to his feet with a tired sigh. "It's Strain III astral bacteria. It's going to eat you alive. If you try and use magic, it will only increase the size of the cloud."

Suda fell to her knees, her eyes wild, choking on the genetically engineered astral killers. "Kovacs!" she hissed desperately.

The tall samurai didn't look back, walking slowly across the pavement to where Mac lay. She tried to reach up to him, but her right arm wouldn't move for some reason. Kovacs reached down, sliding the remains of his right arm under her legs, while his left gripped her. Pain crashed through her as he lifted her from the ground, and she cried aloud. When she could see again, they'd stepped into the street. Ahead of them, crouched like a restless bird of prey, was the Hind. The rear cabin door was open, Tristan standing guard.

"Well aren't you a pair, raggedy man," he said, smiling. Something had kicked off the swordsman's helmet, leaving a bloody crease on his face that trailed up to his scalp. A flap of flesh dangled from his lips, exposing his teeth and spraying blood when he talked. Grenade shrapnel smoldered in a dozen places on his armor, and his strike plates were smeared with lead in at least as many spots. And he was the less wounded of the two of them. He helped Kovacs load Mac into the helicopter, sliding her body across the deckplates in a painful move that finally brought the merciful darkness of unconsciousness down around her.

One, Actual, roll out. Straight to the doc's.

Actual, One, lifting. Not sure the doc will be in. Whatever de Medici did, the city is tearing itself apart.

Kovacs glanced over, out the open door of the Hind as Drift applied power to the collective. The thin corporate suit knelt, cradling his left arm to his body, waving desperately with his right. Tristan had his medkit open, but the samurai gestured towards Mac's unconscious form.

"Her first."

He leaned back against the rear bulkhead, letting the slipstream wash over him and staring out at the stars. He took one last deep, hitching breath, feeling the raw ends of his broken ribs grate together, the warmth of the blood pooling beneath his armor from his other wounds. He saw Tristan glance over at him, then down at the puddle of red leaking across the deckplates and draining down the side of the helicopter.

"Thanks for always being there," said Kovacs.

"It's been an honor," replied Tristan. The two clasped hands, left to left. Kovacs blinked once, twice. His grip slackened.

"Enough," he whispered. The stars faded to black.

???

Somewhere after the world had gone black, Mac lost track of time.

She felt like she was floating in the middle of the inky black waters of the Sound, her body rising and falling with each passing ebb and flow. The cold water was mixed with something sticky like molasses and it clung to every inch of her, letting her do nothing by lay on her back and float along at the whim of the waves. She gazed up at the sky and marveled at just how pitch black it truly was, a polished piece of obsidian stretching out forever, not a star in sight and no lights on any horizon. A chill ran through her as her subconscious questioned if this was death, her new eternity. The cold grew more intense and she opened her mouth to scream and nothing came out, but something rushed in.

The feeling of total, abject emptiness.

Against the deckplates of the Hind where her body laid still, her fingers feebly stretched towards the tall samurai, and found only blood.

21:06:14 Friday, 19 January 2063 – 10780 Leutzen Blvd, Puyallup Seattle

Mac swam upward towards consciousness through layers of cottony darkness. She opened her eyes slowly, blinking up at an unfamiliar ceiling. Every piece of her body hurt. Turning her head to the side, she found the source of the only illumination in the room, the low flickering flames of a camp fire. A solitary figure sat on the remains of a filing cabinet, tending the fire.

"Kovacs," she whispered hoarsely, her throat ravaged. The figure turned, moving immediately to her side.

"How are you feeling?" asked Tristan, offering a bottle of water. Mac drank gratefully, holding the bottle with a right hand that felt thick and numb.

"Where is he?" she asked, knowing that the answer would involve him standing watch or out gathering supplies or something like. Tristan's face told her something else.

"He, ah...he didn't make it."

21:49:22 Friday, 19 January 2063 – 10780 Leutzen Blvd, Puyallup Seattle

Horror marred her features as the bottle slipped from her hand, the water spilling and pooling on the floor beside her. A torrent of tears flooded from her eyes unbidden as she shook her head in denial, anguish pulling choking sobs from her that shook her entire small frame. The physical pain became nothing next to the absolute emotional devastation the swordsman’s four words brought to her world.

Mac’s denial continued, mumbling incoherent fragments of thoughts through the tears that seemed to have no end. She screamed and pushed Tristan away when he tried to comfort her which only served for the swordsman’s hold on her to tighten carefully before she practically disintegrated in his arms and completely let go, muffled only slightly by burying her face into his shoulder. He held her until she was emotionally and physically wrung out, her eyes bloodshot, her throat raw and ravaged, and everything was just numb.

Tristan laid her back to rest, her body shaking with a foreboding sense of cold and grief. She closed her eyes and prayed this was all some dream though her mouth betrayed her when she croaked out a simple word.

“How?”

22:06:18 Friday, 19 January 2063 – 10780 Leutzen Blvd, Puyallup Seattle

Tristan remained silent, reaching down to retrieve the spilled water bottle and replace its cap. Mac couldn't let it go, couldn't begin to let it go until she knew it all. She reached out with her right hand, staring in new found horror at the matte gray synthetic limb which obeyed her commands.

"Wha?" she choked, unable to get the rest of her statement out. The world swung vertiginously around her, her stomach knotting with the threat of emptying itself of whatever was left inside her. Tristan covered her hand with his own, showing the small display screen of his commlink. The picture spoke a thousand words, and although tears blurred her eyes, the image would forever be seared into her memory.

The shot was from the cabin camera of the Hind, the view looking aft from the transom of the tunnel that connected the crew compartment to the cockpit. Mac's body lay on the deck, her feet angled towards the aft port quarter. The damage done by Suda's fireball and the explosion of the Roadmaster was clear, her arm eaten away to carbon cinders at her shoulder, her armor shredded, raw skin exposed and bleeding in numerous places. Tristan had done his best battlefield triage, compression bandages and glossy splotches of synthetic coagulant covering as many of the wounds as possible. The swordsman kneels by her head, looking out the open door on the starboard side of the cabin. In front of him, slumped against the rear cabin wall, is Kovacs. The samurai's head rests on his right shoulder, his eyes sightless. His left arm hangs by his side, hand outstretched, his fingers almost, but not quite touching Mac's where her arm lies.

"By the time we landed at the doc's place, he'd lost too much blood. As it was, we barely saved you. Doc did his best with the arm but it's a generic one, you'll probably want to upgrade at some point in time to something more balanced for your body. Maybe do something about your scars at that time, too. Your hair was a bit of a casualty as well, I cut all the burnt stuff off but I'm no stylist. We couldn't stay long, the clinic was overrun with casualties coming in. Whatever de Medici did, it's torn the city apart. There are still fires burning and power is very intermittent. Drift left to make sure his family is safe. I brought you here for safekeeping, we're pretty far off the beaten path." Tristan's voice is flat, lacking its usual irreverence and sardonic undertone.

22:23:51 Friday, 19 January 2063 – 10780 Leutzen Blvd, Puyallup Seattle

She had managed to stop crying, but her soul was ravaged, left smoldering, dark and wasted. There were too many questions flooding her head at once, enough that they caused confusion and her head to swim a bit, so much so she had no choice but to close her eyes and ride out the dizziness before she could get more answers. But when she closed her eyes, all she could see was the image the swordsman had shared with her. She would have to accept that she never got the chance to say goodbye, but it was clear that even in death and unconsciousness, their bodies, their souls, tried to connect one last time. Somehow that brought her a bit of solace.

She swallowed hard and opened her eyes, pinning the swordsman with a look of concern before she tried to speak again.

“If Drift left to check on his family, why aren’t you? Checking on the people you care about too.”

She didn’t have to say it, they both knew who she was referring to. Demetria.

Mac ran the fingers of her left hand through her hair, or what was left of it at least. All ragged and wild after losing what had burned or been cut off. Before Tristan could even answer her, she bit back on a groan at the terrible, fierce pain that raced through her body with the movement. The pain was so intense, that at first she didn’t even recognize it as pain. It was just like static from a radio station, blaring, until she realized the space they were in was almost silent.

Tears leaked from the corner of her eyes again from the physical pain this time. Mac clenched her hands into fists as she cursed a healthy stream of obscenities until the pain died down to a dull roar. She measured out a string of questions for Tristan to answer, from the basics of what day it was and where exactly they were, to the more complex like what had happened to di Medici, what was happening to the city, and she saved the most painful for last.

“What happened to Kovacs. After, I mean.”

22:31:04 Friday, 19 January 2063 – 10780 Leutzen Blvd, Puyallup Seattle

"Because I made a promise to a friend," replied Tristan, and once more the pain of loss stabbed through her. She knew that in his usual thorough manner Kovacs would have made sure that if anything happened to him, someone would make sure that Mac made it out all right. Her thoughts ticked back to the chip he'd given her just a few days ago, her eyes straying to her commlink and the OMC slot where it rested. Tristan was still talking, though.

"...was an organ donor, so Doc used what he could despite the damage from gun shots and the explosives. Saved three other people with what he took from Kovacs. I fenced his cyberware to help finance our medical costs. Doc charges more when dealing with those of us who are plugged in to the other side of reality. There was a lot of damage, though. In the end, we burned the rest."

The swordsman presses his hands together palm to palm, staring at the flickering flames dancing in the fire pit. His face is drawn and sober.

"I haven't bothered to find out whats happened in the city yet, too much else to take care of and I figured going to ground would be a safer course of action. There will be time after the fires burn out to dissect what went down and who was responsible. de Medici didn't make it. You remember those guys that O'Malley lent us? They got a hold of him. There wasn't much left afterwards."

22:46:19 Friday, 19 January 2063 – 10780 Leutzen Blvd, Puyallup Seattle

Mac let out the breath she was holding in a long rush, hiding none of her bitter and violent hate of the corporate shark, nor where she laid blame for all that happened, her response was simple but said it all.

"Good."

The room descended back into silence, Tristan lost in the flames of the fire and she was still focused on her commlink. She dared to pick it up, flipping it over to its screen in her palm and relieved to see it was still working. She immediately attempted to access the OMC, her need to read Kovacs’ words again nearly overwhelming, though she was pretty sure she could have recited the part she needed to see by heart. While the chip was being accessed, something pulled her attention for an instant away from her commlink and towards the swordsman whose solemn behavior was an unnerving counterpoint to the man she had gotten to know over the past week. She watched him and a sense of worry bubbled up inside her.

“I’m a real giant selfish asshole,” she tried for a little levity, but knew she fell flatter than she had hoped. “I’ve been all about me, me, me since I woke up and haven’t asked how you are doing, or to even say thank you. I’m sorry.”

Her voice seemed to pull Tristan’s attention from wherever he had gone, and he turned his head back towards her, letting her study the healing wounds across his face and try to read just where his head was at.

22:48:52 Friday, 19 January 2063 – 10780 Leutzen Blvd, Puyallup Seattle

Tristan quirked a careful smile her way, his muscles moving slowly to avoid pulling at the stitches keeping his cheek together. "He and I were brothers through a lifetime of war. We've said goodbye more than once. It's just that this time was the last time. It's not selfishness. In the days you knew him, I know you loved years' worth." He put his hand on hers again. "We'll both have plenty of time to mourn what's lost without trying to rush it now."

Mac nodded, turning her palm up so she could grasp his hand, the gesture so familiar that it threatened to bring her to tears again. The two file icons hovering in her AR display, Kovacs - LWT and Kovacs.pra, both showed as accessible. She blinked and frowned, remembering before how she couldn't open the second of the two.