• Published 18th May 2018
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The Runners - DungeonMiner



Rarity is the leader of a team of Runners, mercenaries that work for the great Megacorps, and they've just taken their most dangerous job yet.

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Chapter 8

Rarity was back on the job board within a few days. Since Steel had spent almost all her money on explosives, equipment, and osmium shells. While useful, this has left her with almost nothing, and according to her frequently more panicked inquiries, she had to pay her rent in a few days and needed a job.

When Twilight offered to just pay the rent for her, the street sam, of course, refused. “I ain’t askin’ fer a handout, I just want a job,” she said, almost missing the hurt look Twilight gave her when her help had been refused.

After letting the poor, nearly-in-tears mage know not to take it personally, Rarity began to search her contacts for some kind of job, for anything that would send just a couple hundred nubits Steel’s way. So far, she and her fixer couldn’t find anything too impressive, as she hopped from table to virtual table, dressed in her best, virtual black dress.

Her avatar, a pony with no face, but perfect fashion sense, and a large, blue gem at the base of her neckline, strode through the Matrix bar, a place for Deckers around the world to gather, share, and consume incredible amounts of media in very short periods of time. The bar, located in a dark corner of the Runner boards was a place for all of the Runners that can make a deck sing to hang out, share info, and be themselves in this wide, and crazy world of the matrix.

She moved carefully, weaving through the watcher programs set up by hundreds of paranoid hackers, leaving the strings of code to do their job as their ribbon-like bodies streamed across the place, trailing lights that danced in the room.

The room itself was built out of golden light, a carefully constructed superstructure made to emulate the world’s richest bars, casinos, and cruise ships. A work of love by some board moderator, this room was everything he dreamed it would, going so far as to spit in the face of physics itself, and allowing the room to loop on itself, making the whole place exponentially fantastical simply because ponies could walk on the walls and ceilings.

It made for one of the most beautiful escapes from reality that Rarity had ever had the pleasure of seeing.

In fact, now that she thought about it, she had an episode of Thundr5tep to listen to.

She keyed up her episode, and it began to play through the club’s speakers, while only being actually audible to her.

“Hoi, Chummers. It’s me. No, not your Dad finally coming back from his cigarette run from ten years ago, no it’s Thundr5tep! Today we’re getting into that history of the Matrix episode I promised you, so let’s go ahead and jump into it.

“Back when the awakening happened, it shook things up in the magic world. One of these shake-ups was for a pony named Quickspark. Now Mr. Spark used to be one of the big boys in the magic world, looking to become one of the most powerful wizards in the world. Then the Awakening happened and shattered his dreams faster than a go-ganger’s brick through a shop window, and he was suddenly left in the dust by ponies that, just a day earlier, couldn’t even cast a basic TK spell.

“This left old Mr. Spark bitter and annoyed, basically swearing vengeance against all magic like he’s a character in a trid, and threw himself into a new form of artificing. Long story short, after hundreds of sleepless nights, he created the Matrix 1.0alpha. From there, the idea caught fire, and before long, there were companies dedicated to bringing this crazy idea of connecting ponies through nothing but electricity. “

Rarity slowly made her way across the room, sitting down at a table as she waited for some kind of inspiration to hit her.

“Now we come to the weird part,” Thudr5tep said. “The Matrix as we know it would be nothing if not for a handful of nameless users. Originally thought to be simple nerds, a number of ponies began to generate code like madmen. They kicked out program after program, building new and incredible things in short periods of time, suddenly this tiny little project became a serious venture. Millions of bits were suddenly being poured into this, security, robots, and new interfaces, and more were pushed out in a matter of years.

“That’s when we learned the truth. These weren’t ordinary ponies. These were Technomancers. Able to see the code of the Matrix like a mage peering into the astral plane, these few ponies could almost breathe life into their code. Once we figured that out, well—”

A call paused the recording, leaving the speakers quiet as the sound of ponies trying to talk over their own soundtracks filled the space. A general buzz filled Rarity’s virtual body, and she began to go through the process of stepping out of the Matrix in order to take the call.

She sauntered out of the club, taking her time to greet the other deckers that were within her social circle, as was properly appropriate. “Evening Chip,” she greeted.

“Morning, Gem,” the computer chip on legs replied back. “Careful if you’re doing any big work, the MOD in Canterlot is cracking down tonight. Knew a guy who got fried a few hours ago.”

“Really? That’s awful, not a friend of yours, I hope?”

“Nah, just some chump who tried the big leagues before he was ready for little league. You know the story.”

Rarity shook her head, and her comm rang a second time. “Thank you for the warning, dear, but I must be off.”

Chip nodded and she stepped out of the club into the public Matrix network. Beams of information shot past her at the speed of light, Megapulses of data traveling on 3.0 GHz wavelengths like speeding cars.

Rarity brought up her menu, and jacked out of the Matrix, coming out of the club just in time for her comm to ring a third time.

“Hello?” she answered.

“Gem! It’s me!” Carte Blanche said, grinning wildly, “I found something.”

“What do you have?” Rarity asked.

“I have a contact inside Saddle-Krupp, and she gave this bit before they were going to make the job an APB for GoldStar.”

“They were going to the Star?” Rarity asked. “That’s typically legal work.”

“That’s because the Corp’s trying to spin it like a missing persons case.”

“Okay,” Rarity said. “You have my attention dear, just tell me what’s going on.”

“Saddle-Krupp lost a Technomancer,” Carte said.

Rarity blinked. “What are they asking for him?”

“One mil, minimum,” Carte answered.

“So...they don’t really trust Runners, but if they go to the Star they have to admit to owning a pony, which can still get them in trouble with the Princess if Star leaks.”

“And you know they do,” Carte told her.

“So we have a kidnapping job?”

“You have a job,” she replied.

“You’re the best, Darling,” the Decker said with a smile.

“You’re too kind,” Carte said. “I’m sending you the meetup info. Good luck.”

<><><|><><>

They met at a restaurant in the heart of Canterlot.

It wasn’t a bad restaurant. The whole place was set up with glass, waterfalls, and a calm piano in the background. Ponies in suit jackets and blazers enjoyed conversation with mares dressed in fine dresses as they ate their small, yet criminally overpriced meals.

Rarity loved it.

The place oozed class. They served real food, they had a live band playing classical music, and they were ready to wait hoof and hoof on them. It was the kind of place where Rarity could wear her kevlar weave black dress and look the part. In fact, she was wearing said dress, leading her team down to their reserved table.

The five other mares were excited about the job. This was the kind of money that they could use to get themselves moving forward, even if it had to be split six ways. At the very least it would pay the medical bills they were accruing. They weaved their way through the place, noting the who’s who of Canterlot’s high life as they quickly crossed the restaurant to finally come to a booth at the very back of the room.

Sitting there was their Ringo. Dressed to match his surroundings, the bulky, yet athletic unicorn stallion sat quietly fiddling with his fork as she spun it around his hoof tip. Beside him was his bodyguard, a massive earth pony with a cybernetic hoof not unlike Steel’s, and no doubt hiding a very high-caliber weapon.

The six mares entered the table’s space, and the Ringo glanced up at them. “And who might I have the honor of addressing?” he asked, in a very calm, posh voice.

“We work for our mutual friend Miss Blanche,” Rarity answered as she slid into the booth.

The Ringo nodded, and the bodyguard dutifully slid a partition in front of them before the unicorn himself activated a box on the middle of the table, a gentle buzz filled the air as the white noise generator kicked to life, and began to muffle their conversation from prying ears.

“Hello,” the unicorn said. “I am Mr. Ringo, and I have a job for you.”

“Gem,” Rarity said, introducing herself as she carefully let her pheromones seep into the air. “Let’s get to business, shall we?”

Ringo nodded, before placing his comm on the table, where it suddenly flashed, revealing a hologram of a pony’s face.

“This is your target. A Mr. Doss, a technomancer, that had escaped our custody. We want him back, for obvious reasons. Our asking price is one million nubits. If you accept, we’ll give you more information.”

Rarity nodded. “Sounds like what we were told. But One mil for a technomancer seems a little thin. How’s 1300k?”

“12, but no more,” Ringo replied.

Rarity nodded. Negotiation was a good sign. “Deal.”

Ringo nodded again before his hologram clicked to a new image. “According to our best intel, Mr. Doss has taken refuge in a building just across the street from an Ahuiztechnology building. If our ponies were to move in, it could cause a shootout between us and the Ahuiztech security teams. This is unacceptable, as it could endanger our target, as well as possibly lead Ahuiztech to discover what we’re looking for.”

“And that could cause problems,” Rarity noted.

“To understate it, yes.”

Rarity nodded, before stealing a glance at Web.

The poor mare was shaking, almost imperceptibly, but her nerves were becoming more obvious. Still the mage nodded. She’d do this.

“Then we’ll get right on it,” Rarity said with a smile.

“Excellent. Allow me to buy you some dinner before you go. If you can do this as quietly as Ms. Blanche says you can, then this is the least I can do.”

<><><|><><>

“What do you see, Wingmare?” Rarity asked. She sat in the back of Candy’s van, talking into her comm as she worked on keeping her PAN—and the rest of her team—invisible to anyone looking for it online.

“A whole lot of nothing,” the pegasus replied. “I’ve checked all the windows on the north, west, and south side of the building, but I haven't seen any sign of our target. If I could check the east side—”

“Then you’d get us all caught, and bring Auhiztech down on us,” Steel grumbled. “And honestly, the last thing I want to do is catch the bad side of those freaks.”

“You’re not the only one,” Rarity said, before glancing at Web.

The shaman was in the back of the van with her, holding a blanket over her head like she was a filly. The poor dear was a mess, but that wasn’t a surprise. She always broke down whenever Ahuiztech was involved.

“Are you alright, Web?” Rarity asked.

“I’m...I’m fine…” she whispered, her voice losing that harsh, merciless quality that Rarity was used to.

“Yeah, yeah,” Wingmare said. “I know why we’re not going to the east side, I’m just saying that it’s making my job harder than it needs to be.”

“That’s what Rookie’s there for,” Rarity told her. “Technomancers aren’t good with magic, so she’s our ace in the hole right now.”

“Speaking of tech,” Wingmare said, “why aren’t you hacking his system?”

Rarity sighed. “Because that’s a very dangerous thing to do. Everything I can do, he can do. I may be able to do it better than him, but he has Sprites too.”

“He has what now?” Steel asked.

“Sprites. Nopony’s really sure what they are, but I’ve heard them described as Tech Elementals.”

There was silence on the line for a second, before Steel spoke again. “That sounds both hilarious, and horrifying.”

“That’s why I’m waiting,” Rarity explained. “I don’t want to rush in there, only to find out he’s broken into my PAN and taken out every gun we have. Not to mention the Sprites, whatever they are.”

“Alright, alright, forget I said anything,” Wingmare said. “I was just wondering.”

“And that’s why I’m not using Tiny, Rocky or Balboa,” Candy said, cutting in. “I don’t want them exploding.”

“Ya know, that’s fair,” Steel said.

“Yeah, yeah, I get it. I get it,” Wingmare said. “Hang on, I have movement.”

The whole line went silent. They waited, with bated breath as Wingmare glared down at the movement in her sight.

A long second passed.

“Negative, just the pizza guy.”

Steel sighed. “I hate it when they do that.”

“Yeah, but you can’t hate a guy for ordering pizza though,” Candy said.

“Fair enough,” Wingmare agreed.

“Okay,” Twilight said, her voice suddenly cutting into the discussion. “I think I found something.”

“Please don’t bring any Ahuiztech elementals with you…” Web whispered.

“I couldn’t see what he had, but he definitely glows. He has some kind of magic, and that sounds exactly like a technomancer. He’s surrounded by mundane stuff, decks of various kinds, and some other objects that I couldn’t really see. The important thing is, he doesn’t seem to be expecting us.”

“Which room is he in, Rookie?” Rarity asked.

“Oh, right, east side, southern corner apartment.”

“I knew it!” the pegasus grumbled.

“Not right now, Wingmare,” Rarity said, as her mind began to churn. “Okay, so he’s in the southeastern corner, with a bunch of machinery. He’s not expecting anything, but any technomancer that just got out isn’t going to let his guard down. If that’s the case, then why isn’t he worried somepony’s coming for him?”

“Maybe he’s not worried somepony’s coming, because he has something set up? Has traps laid down?” Steel suggested.

“Maybe he’s trying to escape his body and live in the Matrix as ghost code!” Candy suggested.

“That’s not how that works, Candy,” Rarity said, rolling her eyes.

“It could be, he’s a technomancer, who knows?”

That...was actually a point. “Let’s…let’s stick to more plausible theories. We’ll keep that one on the back burner.”

“How did he escape?” Web asked.

Rarity opened her mouth, but then slowly closed it again when she realized she did not, in fact, have an answer to that.

“Ponies like us don’t just escape,” Web continued, “they’re let loose by something. Who let him loose?”

The words rang across the comm line, almost echoing in their collective earpieces as a terrible, awful realization came over all of them.

The Technomancer had a team of Runners.

“Wingmare move!” Rarity suddenly yelled. “You’ve been still too long! You need to move, now!”

There was no answer for a second. “Wingmare?”

“Still here,” she grunted, before crying out with a yell, “but if you had told me a second sooner, I wouldn’t have this idiot trying to stab me.”

The door to the van opened, and two stallions with bladed cyber legs stood at the back, ready to rip them to shreds. “Sorry girls, just business.”

Tires screeched and rubber burned as the van lurched forward, dragging a razorboy with them as they began to careen down the street. Rarity hit the shag carpeting of the back of the van, and landed hard, knocking the wind out of her, and leaving her dazed on the floor.

Web cowered beneath her blanket, and the razorboy, still clinging to the door, grunted as he tried to get into a better position. “Come on! Don’t cower. You’re a Runner, go down like one.”

Rarity answered with a burst from her submachine gun, spraying him with bullets. The razorboy’s subdermal armor absorbed the small arms fire easily, leaving only broken skin as the beast stood in front of her.

“That’s better,” the razorboy growled before he raised his bladed hoof.

Web exploded out from under the blanket, glowing mana pouring from her mouth, eyes, and hooves, before a magical explosion slammed into the enemy Runner, blowing him off, and throwing him onto the asphalt.

Rarity sighed, before checking the shaman.

She was breathing heavily, gasping for breath. “You alright.”

“Better now that we’re further away from that place.”

Rarity groaned, pulling up her comm. “Who's still on site?”

“Steel and I are here,” Twilight said.

“We could move in,” Steel confirmed.

“Negative. I don't trust my PAN to hold up, and at this distance, if he hacks your legs, I might not be able to fix them in time.”

“So what's the plan?” Steel asked.

Rarity bit her lip. She couldn't have them going in against a Technomancer, especially since all of Steel's chrome would be irresistible for him to get his hooves into. No, she needed a plan. If he was out cold, then it'd be safe, but...“Okay, you'll move in, but you're not going in alone. Move slowly, I'll need some time to get things moving.”

Without another word, Rarity jacked in deep-diving into the Matrix.

<><><|><><>

Tall, data superstructures reached for the sky like skyscrapers, and a massive, ancient step pyramid could be seen in the distance.

Ahuiztech always preferred the Tenochtitlan aesthetic. They slapped it onto everything, and even if she didn't like them, Rarity had to admire their dedication to the theme. However, being this close did make her nervous.

Drawing her virtual fedora and trenchcoat tighter around her, she began to search for her target. In headspace, she'd be zipping across the data highway, flying at incredible speeds as she tried to regain the ground that the van put between her and their target. Yet, in the Matrix, she walked, thinking deeply about what she was going to do.

This wasn't her first run-in with a technomancer, she once knew a young stallion that didn't know when to keep his mouth shut in her earlier Running days. She witnessed what they could do first-hand.

They could build sprites to act independently, to defend or maintain programs while the technomancer was away.

That, alone, was scary. The average program was tough, but they were dumb. They needed a watcher program to direct them, and if you were fast enough, you'd be in and out before the lethal Black ICs were even called up.

The head of a Tenochtitlan warrior, an Ahuiztech watcher, hovered overhead, checking for any threats to their system.

Rarity stayed on the path, avoiding suspicion. As she continued to walk, her thoughts continued to churn.

The problem with a sprite was because they could make judgment calls. They could direct ICs like a pony could. They were practically a Spider, and they were dangerous. That meant that a technomancer with a heavy ICs setup could have a sprite on overwatch, ready to act.

It would have to go down first.

She looked up at the building, where a Black Intrusion Countermeasure, dressed as a hulking troll, wandered around the building. If she got hit with that, it'd be more than a little dumpshock, that thing could fry her brain if she wasn't careful.

It was time to get to work.

A quick text to Steel and Rookie, letting them both know it was time move, and Rarity began. She ran a quick spoof program to disguise her signature as an Ahuiztech watcher and she was off.

It wouldn’t let her get too close, the Sprite would figure something was wrong, but it would be a good start.

She hovered over the building, carefully taking her time. A figure, a tiny program that hovered on the shoulder of the Black IC, watching her, but neither of them moved. Attacking Ahuiztech would not be a good idea, especially when you wanted to stay under the radar.

Rarity, meanwhile, continued to prepare her attacks. She had a crash program lined up for the sprite, hopefully crippling it while she dealt with the IC. She did have a hammer program that could send multiple data spikes at the IC, but if the Sprite didn’t go down, then she might have to redirect it at the Sprite.

The large, black troll wandered around mindlessly, following its programming of murdering anything that entered his master’s server space.

Rarity hovered closer, daring as much as she could to inch toward the pair.

The Sprite was becoming suspicious.

Rarity paused, took a virtual breath, and attacked.

The crash program hit the sprite dead on, forcing it down and induced a reboot. It’d be out for seconds, which was more than enough time for her to put this IC in its place.

She slammed her hammer program, spamming the Troll with data spikes that quickly destabilized the beast, but it wouldn’t be deterred yet.

It raised its hands, preparing its own, lethal spike before Rarity quickly began to reconfigure her deck. She altered the programming of her machine to reroute damage elsewhere. It meant she couldn’t counter immediately with her own attack, but it meant she wouldn’t be fried the second that spike hit her.

Pain flared through her whole body, and her vision went white as damaging amounts of feedback blew backward through her brain. Her deck took most of the damage off of her, but she was definitely bleeding from the nose now.

With the attack passed, she reconfigured her deck again, dedicating every pulse of processing power to her data spikes before she spammed the troll with everything she and her deck had.

The data spikes ripped the IC apart, leaving it as nothing but shreds of code, blowing in the datastream.

Rarity sighed. That tactic was always a gamble. There was no way to reconfigure a deck fast enough to move from the defensive configuration to attack and then back to defend for the next counter. It was the kind of strategy that demanded that they only get to attack once.

She didn’t have time to think about it. She had to deal with the sprite. It would reboot any second now, and she had to deal with it now, while it was still weak. Still, in her “glass cannon” configuration she poured even more spikes into the downed Sprite, murdering it while it was still booting up.

Once it’s already incorporeal body faded away, Rarity sighed. So far, things were going to plan. Still, she wasn’t done, and if she wanted to keep Steel and Rookie from walking into what was probably a turret trap, she had to keep moving forward.

She began to scan the network the IC and the Sprite had been connected to, searching for anything that could be running silently in the background as she searched for any trace of devices. It took her a moment, but, as if she were psychic, the signature of three turrets was revealed to her sight.

She began to mark them, taking ownership of them very quickly.

At this point, it’d be almost child’s play to turn them both on the technomancer, and fill him with bullets. Of course, that would mean that their target would be dead, and they wouldn’t be getting paid. No, she needed to get his attention, and if she was going to do that, then all she needed to do was spin them around.

With that done, she waited, prepping her Blackout program along with her Lockdown program to keep him from running, that, paired with her Cat’s Paw executable would keep him from working his own programs.

That was the plan anyway.

A short fraction of a second later, and all three programs were queued up, ready to go.

And that’s when Quickspark stepped into his network. Dressed as Anonymous, the least creative icon on the Matrix, and growled. “Who’s messing with my—”

And that was as far as he got before Rarity nuked him.

First she hit him with the Cat’s Paw, limiting his reaction time, and forcing him on the defensive. She immediately followed up with the Lockdown, taking away his ability to jack out of the Matrix for a moment or two. Once he was locked Rarity began dumping data into him, wrecking his body with biofeedback as she poured everything she had into him.

Quickspark tried to counter, throwing his own data spike back at her, but he shot wide. She didn’t even have to dodge.

Finally, she threw the Blackout program at him, hoping that all the damage and the dumpshock he was about to take would keep him under as Steel and Rookie walked into the room.

The icon twitched. Once, twice, and the went red as he automatically kicked out of the Matrix, the only safety feature the whole dumb network had.

Rarity sighed. That was a tough job, but that’s why she’s the best.

A text to Steel and Rookie that their target was ready for pick up, and she was ready to jack out.

A text appeared. “Gem, you’re bleeding from your nose, is everything alright?”

Rarity smiled. “Everything’s fine, Web, just packing up.”

And with that, she left the Matrix, satisfied in a job well done.

She appeared back in the van, to the sound of gunfire.

"Right," she thought with a sigh.

"Job’s not done yet..."