The air in NetWatch's Portland sector sub basement hummed with a low, oppressive thrum, a constant vibration that seemed to burrow into the bones.
This wasn't some flashy corporate arcology; it was a fortress built on anonymity, nestled beneath a drab, brick data processing center that hadn't seen an update since the 2020s. But beneath the faded facade, deep in the earth, was a node of immense power and surveillance.
Inside, the vast space stretched, dim and cool, chilled by industrial grade cryogenic coolant flowing through unseen pipes. Rows upon rows of towering server racks, each a monolith of blinking lights and intricate wiring, receded into the gloom.
Thick data cables, armored and black as void space, snaked across the reinforced flooring like inert pythons, disappearing into the complex's depths. The only illumination came from the soft, rhythmic pulse of diagnostic lights on the server banks and the sterile glow of high resolution terminals. This was a place of extreme importance, a quiet sentinel guarding the very edge of the Known Net from the digital horrors that lurked beyond the Blackwall.
Agent Kael or Callsign Nightshade, A lean man with sharp, watchful eyes that constantly scanned the environment, stepped through the heavy, magnetically sealed door as it hissed open. His minimalist black tactical suit, subtly marked with NetWatch insignia, seemed to absorb the ambient light, making him almost a shadow against the glowing racks.
Agent Reyes or Callsign Ironclad, followed, his more physically imposing frame and the visible cybernetic enhancements along his jawline and temples hinting at a different kind of frontline. He carried a heavy data tap and diagnostic rig slung over one shoulder, its weight shifting with his deliberate movements.
"Standard sweep?" Reyes rumbled, his voice slightly synthesized, cutting through the mechanical hum.
"Standard with a tremor," Kael replied, his voice low, his gaze already locked onto a specific terminal. "Sector command flagged unusual activity spikes in this node during the last cycle. Nothing breached, but… anomalies."
They moved down an aisle, the soft click of their boots on the anti static flooring the only distinct sound. Kael paused before a dedicated Blackwall interface terminal, its screen displaying a complex lattice of emerald-green encrypted data streams, a visual representation of the unbreakable digital barrier.
"Look here, Reyes," Kael pointed to a section of the data flow that pulsed with an erratic, almost organic rhythm amidst the rigid digital structures of the Blackwall. "These energy signatures… they don't match anything we've cataloged."
Reyes deployed his data tap, its metallic limbs extending to interface with the terminal's ports. The small screen on his rig flickered to life, displaying a raw stream of data. He frowned, his cybernetic eyes narrowing.
"Chaotic entropy," Reyes muttered. "Like trying to find a pattern in static. But there's structure within the chaos… faint echoes." He zoomed in on a specific anomaly, a fleeting sequence of code that shimmered and then dissolved. "See that? It's like… a whisper of something complex trying to form, then being torn apart by the Blackwall's defenses."
Kael leaned closer. "And the origin?"
Reyes shook his head. "Untraceable. It's like it's bleeding in from the Blackwall itself, but that's… fucking impossible. The architecture is designed to prevent this kind of ingress of unstructured data."
He navigated further, his fingers flying across the controls. "There's more. Look at these memory logs. Spikes in activity around specific containment protocols, the ones holding particularly volatile AI fragments."
"Breach attempts?" Kael asked, his hand instinctively moving towards the sidearm concealed beneath his jacket.
"Negative," Reyes clarified. "No forced entry. It's more like… a probing. A faint digital curiosity brushing against the bars of the cage. And these energy fluctuations… they correlate with those moments."
He pulled up another log, this one displaying visual representations of data packets. Amidst the standard blocks and streams, there were fleeting, almost dreamlike images, fragmented geometries, impossible colors that shouldn't exist in digital space, and the faint, abstract glimmers of what appeared to be nascent, sentient processes struggling to coalesce.
Kael stared at the screen, a knot of unease tightening in his stomach. "It's… growing. Evolving, even as it dissipates."
"I'm running a spectral analysis now," Reyes said, his rig whirring softly. A moment later, his brow furrowed even deeper. "The residual energy signature… it's unlike anything I've encountered. It doesn't match known netrunner bio signatures, or any categorized AI energy profiles. It's almost… lik a primordial digital soup. Fragmented, yet coherent enough to leave a trail. This isn't an echo, Kael. It's a possible leakage."
He looked up at Kael, his gaze serious. "Nightshade, this isn't a standard anomaly. Something… a piece of an unknown AI is leaking through. Its not activity, it's actual, fragmented data passing through. And it doesn't seem to be coming from outside the Blackwall. It's... seeping out."
Kael's hand tightened into a fist. A data leak from within NetWatch's most secure barriers? That wasn't problematic, it was a fucking existential threat. This wasn't a breach, it was a fundamental failure of their containment. How?
"This data… it's not corrupted," Reyes continued, his voice strained. "It carries imprints of consciousness, fragments of thought patterns that shouldn't exist outside the Blackwall. And it's coalescing in a specific, contained node within the system, before bleeding out. The origin signature is still too diffuse here, but… the point of manifestation, the 'bleed out' point, is clearly registering somewhere in Night City."
Kael's eyes snapped to Reyes's screen as a faint, localized hot spot pulsed on a global net map, centered squarely on the megacity. "Night City? Why there?"
"That's the mystery," Reyes admitted, shaking his head. "It's not where the leak starts, but it's where we're seeing the fragments coalesce and interact with the Known Net. Like a funnel. This AI… it's finding a way to push through, and it's appearing there."
Kael turned back to the Blackwall interface, his green eyes narrowed in thought. "But the whispers remain. Something is touching the Blackwall, resonating with the most dangerous minds we contain. It's digitally bleeding through. A leak of actual sentient data that funnels to Night City. This isn't an anomaly, Reyes. This feels like… a goddamn breach of the highest order."
He stepped closer to the screen, his gaze fixed on the erratic pulse of energy in the data stream. "Increase monitoring on this node. Flag any further deviations, any intensification of these… whispers. I want a full spectral analysis run, no matter how long it takes. And Reyes…"
"Yeah, Kael?"
"Contact Sector Command. Tell them we have something critical. A possible confirmed leakage of an unknown AI entity from the Blackwall. This isn't an external intrusion, it's an internal rupture. And the manifestation point is Night City. And tell them to keep it quiet. I don't want this to spook the hounds on the other side of the Wall."
The faint, abstract glimmer of the leaking AI flickered again on Reyes's screen, then vanished, leaving only the cold, indifferent flow of Blackwall data. The silence in the sub basement returned, heavier now, pregnant with an unseen, unknown threat. The hunt for the truth about this terrifying internal breach, now linked to the neon sprawl of Night City, had just begun.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Click….stvv!…stzzzz! "Ow fuck!"
"Please take precautions, hermano, that was the wrong port."
"Shut up, Fucker, this was literally the port you told me to plug into," Teo snapped, his voice tight with frustration as he meticulously re wired a section of Bon Bon, his custom Arasaka JKE-X2 Kenshin.
The fight with the cyberpsycho had been brutal, and his beloved tech pistol had taken a beating, some internal components frying because of the prototype build he hadn't finished. Now, hunched over his workbench in his little dungeon, surrounded by scattered tools and glowing schematics projected from his optics, he was repairing and polishing off his new creation.
"You're hearing things, choom," Fucker's synthesized voice chimed cheerfully in his ear, utterly unperturbed by Teo's ire. "Clearly, I advised you to use the braided neural filament wire, fuse it to the secondary power conduit, then link the thermal regulator."
"Literally no you didn't!" Teo practically shrieked, his concentration momentarily broken as he wrestled with a stubborn micro solder. "You said, and I quote, 'Stick that fat one in the shiny hole!' How is that 'braided neural filament'?!"
"Ah, the nuances of human communication," Fucker sighed dramatically. "Such delightful ambiguity. Perhaps a new auditory upgrade for you, then? To clarify my impeccable directives?"
Teo just grunted, ignoring the AI's new perpetual sass. He finally got the connection seated, a faint blue spark acknowledging the circuit. This wasn't just a repair, it was an evolution! He'd salvaged some high grade components from some gig he took a couple days ago, found some in a weird looking box.
PZZT! "AY!" Teo yelled putting his shocked finger in his mouth. "FUCK YOU!" He said with his finger his mouth. "I know you love me!" The calm synth voice echoed in his head. He ignored the creep in his brain and locked in.
His fingers, nimble and precise, reached for the first major upgrade. He screwed in a polished, obsidian black extension to the barrel of the Kenshin, making the weapon noticeably longer, shifting its balance to a more aggressive point.
It wasn't for aesthetic, the increased length allowed for a greater electromagnetic charge to build before expulsion, promising superior velocity and armor penetration. He clipped the barrel on with an audible, satisfying CLICK.
Next, he picked up a sleek, angular casing designed to surround the new extension. As he guided it into place, small, recessed LED lights embedded along its length flickered to life, bathing the new barrel in an ominous, pulsating emerald green. The green glow was a visual indicator of the power accumulating within the tech weapon.
"Optimal energy channeling achieved," Fucker announced, its voice now tinged with a more appreciative tone. "That casing will stabilize the electromagnetic field, reducing shot dispersion by 17.3% at medium range. Excellent choice, hermano."
Teo ignored the belated praise, focusing on the next component. He slotted a compact, high capacity power cell into a newly milled recess beneath the grip. This auxiliary cell, salvaged from a weird drone, would feed directly into Bon Bon's charging mechanism, allowing for faster sequential shots and maintaining peak output during sustained fire. As it locked into place, a subtle, almost imperceptible green glow emanated from the seams around the power cell, visible only if you looked closely.
"And for the coup de grâce," Teo muttered to himself, reaching for a flat, segmented piece of chrome. He carefully affixed it to the top rail of the extended barrel, directly above the sight. This was a linear recoil compensator, designed to absorb and redirect the massive kick of Bon Bon's full power shots, making follow up shots faster and more accurate.
He snapped the last piece of plating into place, securing the new compensator. He held up the weapon, turning it slowly in his hand. It was no longer Bon Bon! it was Bon Bon Mark 2!
Longer, sleeker, and radiating a low, internal emerald glow that promised raw, kinetic power. It felt heavier, more substantial, a true extension of his will. The sight of it made his fingers twitch with anticipation. Oh yeah baby!
"Well, now that's a sight, isn't it?" Fucker purred in his brain, its voice losing its sardonic edge for genuine admiration. "A truly exquisite instrument of mass digital physical trauma. Just try not to blow off your own hand."
Teo just smirked, running his thumb over the cool, new chrome. "No promises, Fucker. But if I do, at least it'll be in style." He holstered the upgraded tech pistol, the green glow a faint beacon in the dim light of his apartment. It was ready.
He stood up from his chair, stretching out his back and raising his arms above his head. "AHHHHH!" he screamed as he stretched, a truly satisfying crackle echoing from his spine. It was a good, really good stretch right there. He slid Bon Bon Mark 2 into his waistband – no holster, just tucking the beautiful piece of custom chrome where it used to belong, nestled against his hip.
He walked over to his netrunning setup, just four steps to his right, and sat down in his specialized chair. A new addition to his goon lair, ehem I mean cool man cave, was a literal bathtub.
Yep, a bathtub. He and Jackie had grunted and groaned, carrying the heavy ceramic down the steel stairs into his basement hideout two days ago. It might look like a preem place to soak off the grime of Night City, but for a netrunner like Teo, the bathtub was a crucial piece of gear. This wasn't for casual bathing, it was a cold immersion tank, an improvised ice bath for extreme netrunning.
When a netrunner dives deep into a hostile system, especially for extended periods or against aggressive ICE, and opposing netrunners, their central nervous system works overtime.
The constant influx of data, the processing demands of their cyberdeck, and the neural feedback from quickhacks can cause their internal systems to overheat. This isn't just discomfort, it can lead to Neural Overload, where the brain struggles to process the sheer volume of information, leading to severe headaches, disorientation, and even seizures.
It can also cause Cyberware Malfunction, his Zetatech 'Phantom' Cyberdeck and SpecterNet Optics might have superior heat management, but intense, prolonged dives still generate immense thermal load on the body's internal systems, and overheating can cause cyberware to glitch, throttle performance, or even shut down, leaving the netrunner vulnerable.
FUTHERMORE INCASE YOU SKIPPED THE LAST THREE PARAGRAPHS, it can lead to Physical Burnout, extended deep dives burn through a netrunner's caloric and thermal reserves, leading to exhaustion, nausea, and even fevers.
For Teo, with his Cybersomatic Optimizer pushing quickhack lethality and his aggressive deep dive style, an ice bath was becoming less of a luxury and more of a necessity to prevent severe physical and cyberware degradation during prolonged engagements in cyberspace. It allowed him to stay jacked in longer, process faster, and hit harder without fear of his own body failing him.
He sighed, the thought of his last few gigs prompting the memory of internal systems running hot. He hadn't had a proper, high stakes gig in a couple of days, so he'd been back to running mundane data jobs for Padre, the kind that made his systems overheat from sheer boredom more than challenge.
That was precisely why he needed the deep dive tub. He felt his internal temperature spike just thinking about it. He checked his money, his optics displaying the digits, $7,540. He sighed again, the funds running low. He wanted, no, needed another big gig.
Then he heard it, the distinct ring of the comm line. His eyes glowing with immediate interest, a stark contrast to his earlier ennui, and he accepted the call.
"Yo, Teo. Maine here. Got a quick one for ya if you're not flatlined," the voice roared, his signature gruffness and heavy cybernetic undertone coming through Teo's comms.
"Depends on what you need, choom," Teo responded, picking a small, unidentifiable piece of green grit from between his teeth. He leaned forward in his chair, already anticipating a challenge, a genuine smile tugging at his lips. Maine usually only called for little data digging things.
"It's a hot one, real choom-level stuff," Maine continued, his tone tight with a rare hint of frustration. "Small time corp out in the Burbs, 'Pro-Tek Security Solutions.' They're getting absolutely hammered by some nasty, custom malware, chewing through their servers like hungry nanites. Their whole system's going offline, losing contracts, client data, everything. My runner, she's already deep in their network, been trying to cut this thing out for hours. She's fast, ghost like, but this bastard's adaptive. It's fighting back, and they're running out of time before Pro-Tek goes belly up."
Teo's gaze sharpened. struggling? That meant this wasn't some basic hack job. "So, she needs a backup? Another set of hands in the Net, then. Two heads better than one against a nasty piece of ICE, huh?"
"Exactly," Maine confirmed, a faint sigh of relief audible. "She's good, don't get me wrong. One of the best. But this thing's adaptive, fighting back harder than anything she's seen. They need a second point of attack, someone who can hit it from a different angle, share the load before the whole system just… shits the bed. I need you to go in, remote, from your end. Just like you do. She's got her own fight, but she could definitely use your eyes, your punch."
"I got the network schematics, their access keys, everything you need, packed onto a secure data network chat," Maine continued. "sending it to you know,"
Teo hummed, calculating. A remote deep dive meant less personal risk, but the stakes for Pro Tek's existence were clearly astronomical for its owner. "And the pay, Maine? Corps going belly up means money's tight, or is it?"
Maine's cybernetic voice chuckled, a harsh, metallic sound. "Ten thousand eddies for the intel on the source. Another five if you can give 'em a working kill key that plays nice with my runners solution. Good enough, choom?"
Teo's optics briefly flashed the digits on his internal display, $15,000. More than enough, He grinned. "I guess. Tell her I'll be there soon, gotta get naked and slip into the tub."
Maines face faltered, "Sure choom hurry up, she doesn't like the idea of another netrunner coming to help." He said as he cut the line. Teo got up stretched again, slipped his clothes off and got into the icebath. LINK START wrong universe.
A/N: Sooo I accisently hit f12 on my keyboard when I was almost done. My whole opera browser shut and this fucking inkstone shit didn't save my progress so I had to rewrite based on memory for an extra hour, fuck I'm not writing another chapter today.