The Freelancers

by OverHeart

Chapter 3 - Deep Dive - Part One

The two walked the streets of the Sprawl in relative silence, up ahead the bright orange neon signage of the Chilled Coffee Netcafe lit up the street as it pulsed and flashed.

The cafe building itself was strangely clean compared to the streets and surrounding buildings and the two raised an eyebrow to the sight.

“Someones been making a special effort.” Sheet Rock huffed.

“Probably so he can make more Euro. Appeal to a bigger crowd maybe.” Access shot back.

Sheet Rock trotted ahead of Access and pushed open the door, a buzzer sounded loudly from behind the counter which got the attention of the front counter clerk, Chilled Coffee, the owner and namesake of the place.

“Welcome to Chilled Coffee, I am Chilled Coffee, how may I help you today!”

Sheet Rock visibly cringed from the repetition and turned her gaze to meet the beige colored pony, hoping her shockingly visible distaste for the name had been missed.

“Mr. Coffee, Yes we would like to a rent a pod, for business reasons. If you would.”

“Just a single pod for yourself, Miss Sheet? Or perhaps a couples pod?” Chilled Coffee said with a grin as he gestured to Access.

Sheet Rock ground her teeth together as she put on a faux smile. “A couples pod would be great!”

Chilled Coffee nods and pushes a small keycard towards them.

The pods would allow them to be in relative safety while they were conducting their recon on the target system, while not particularly resistant to gunfire the pods would ensure their bodies would be in decent shape by the time they came back to Realspace.

The one they’d rented was a couples pod, double sized but still quite small and would fit the two of them comfortably if a little cramped in places.

“We’ll connect there directly. If we get traced, disconnect and run as far and as fast as your legs will take you, Got it?” Sheet Rock informed.

Access nodded. “Got it.”

The two approached their pod, it was a cylindrical structure covered in cables and connectors sat on a wide base, made of a clean white and clinical steel, inside which was a lounger with two seats and slots for Cyberdecks on both sides of the interior, should the client want to use their own interfacing gear.

The pod’s lid swiveled open revealing the cramped interior, Sheet Rock climbed up the short steps and laid down in one of the soft memory foam seats, leaving Access to occupy the other.

The two slid their Cyberdecks into the side slots of the pods interior and plug in their neural cables as the lid swivels closed above them which left them in the dim blue light of the pods interior lighting.

Sheet Rock taps Access’ fore-hoof. “Be careful, yeah?”

“I’m always careful.” Access said with a slight smile.

The pod began to hum as the interior became darker, slowly the two fell unconscious as their minds left their bodies and dove into the Net once more.

Upon connecting to the mysterious sub-net directly, they found themselves in a large expanse of rolling digital landscape and in the center, a stylized golden crown.

“Looks like we have our work cut out for us.” Sheet Rock grumbled as she stared up at the rotating crown structure.

“As long as we don’t act too suspiciously we shouldn’t get noticed by any passing security. This is a gray system after all and we can take out time.“ Access pointed out with a grin.

He had taken the liberty of masking their signals as they arrived, a popular trick for Netrunners to gain themselves some time as long as they didn’t do anything overtly hostile or stay too long.

“Are we going to have to climb all the way to the top of that?” Sheet Rock inquired.

Access called up an AR display and ran a scout program. A small winged cube fizzed into existence beside him and he ordered it to scout ahead of them. It darted off indifferently and begun to scan its surroundings.

Shortly after, the scout program notified Access of a structure below the crown in the distance but couldn’t provide any further details as to its use.

“Hopefully not, from here I can’t pick out any actual structures within the crown itself. It might just be a huge logo. But there is something below it.” Access stated as he dismissed his AR display.

“Let’s see if the structure below it turns up anything then, keep your eyes peeled for anything that looks hostile.”

Access nods and the two step onto the shifting digital landscape that lay before them.

As they got closer they could make out the structure below the crown in the distance, it looked like a tall, dark and yet gleaming needle-like tower that reached into the sky and into the bottom of the crown, evidently so it could rotate cleanly on its axis.

“I have to wonder why they spend so much time on something few would ever see.” Access grumbled.

“Who cares, let’s just get this data and leave already.”

The two come to the base of the needle-like structure, at its base was a number of winged orbs wreathed in a pale gold light. They regarded Access’ scout program with the same indifference it afforded them.

The structure itself had no discernible doors or entryways but had what looked like a control panel on one edge, when Access approached it the panel jumped to life.

“I’ll deal with this, keep an eye out in-case those programs are hostile.” Access stated.

“I’m not so sure, they look like your scout program. Just a different shape and colored gold.” Sheet Rock pointed out.

“Probably the system’s eyes or something.” Access said as he tapped at the panel, which defiantly displayed an Access Denied message, which made him chuckle slightly.

Sheet Rock moved to get a closer look at the programs hovering over head, one dropped to her level and looked her straight in the face which made her step back a little. It felt like she was being studied.

“Something is definitely watching us.” Sheet Rock said as she stared back.

Access put on a scowl as the panel once again defeated his attempts at gaining access to its secrets, he stepped away slightly and rose a hoof in its direction. A jolt of green lightning jumped from the tip of his hoof and at the panel.

The programs overhead flickered slightly along with the entire landscape and with a smile Access stepped back towards the panel with a cocky grin.

“I’ve never let something beat me before and you wont be the one thing that manages to stop me.” he whispered.

All of the programs that buzzed above their heads now had their entire attention focused on the both of them, yet they continued to observe with indifference.

“What the hell did you do?”

“Just a small cracking program, a little louder than I had hoped but it doesn’t seem to have bothered them any.” Access pointed out as he absentmindedly gestured.

A pit formed in Sheet Rock’s stomach as she looked all around her, something was watching them and it seemed perfectly okay with observing them as they both worked.

Author's Note:

This one is a two part chapter so i'd be able to keep it under my 1500 word limit, i feel as if it'd make it easier to read if it was shorter per chapter.

By all means feel free to say otherwise, it'd be interesting to see peoples views on such things.

As always, tell me of any glaring issues as they are noticed.