Chapter — 17

Eight months into her confinement, Rei had shown enough competency to be given some real work on analyzing data and decrypting stuff. Her programming skills would have remained stationary if not for the puzzles she still completed between jobs and her work on the private realm's security.

Rei could now anticipate WolfMosh's arrival two whole seconds before he appeared — the ICE not giving him much trouble but able to slow him down some. Still, it was progress.

Her last nine jobs had shown an increasing trend, which, with her [Data Analytics] skill helping connect the clues, caused Rei to become increasingly concerned.

WolfMosh and her fellow apprentices had said that it wasn't anything to worry about, but her [Deception] skill told her that they were downplaying the issue.

Something was happening outside Cyber Fang HQ, and even if she wasn't clear on precisely what, the data she'd decrypted oozed conflict.

Casualty reports, weapon transport routes, lists of combat cyberware replacement parts bought in bulk, medical supply storage locations, and other things in the same vein.

What held her attention the most, however, was the cyberware parts she'd found such large orders for.

Rei only had to ask some innocuous and leading questions to Franklin, who was more than happy to talk about his one true love. What he said made Rei confident that she had a grasp on what was going on.

Thanks to Franklin's unknowing help in determining the function of each spare part of cyberware, it was evident that they combined into cybernetic forearms with an inbuilt piston connecting the wrist and hand. Rei even double-checked by extracting the data for the spare parts she'd saved, bringing forth their 3D models, and assembling a virtual copy.

Open conflict with The Pistons. Perhaps even a full-out war.

It was the only conclusion she could draw with the data available to her. And due to this, there was something she had to do. She had tried to ask for this boon several times before, but no matter what he said this time, she wouldn't bend.

The data showed that even if she wasn't in danger where she currently was, her siblings may well be. Especially if they put themselves in the crossfire between her and their adversaries. She could see Ichiro doing it, if only for the thrill of combat.

Rei dismissed the data she'd been analyzing and disconnected from the mesh without WolfMosh's permission.

***

The boss of the Cyber Fangs sat in a comfortable yet slightly scuffed armchair of insanely expensive genuine leather — something he'd gotten as payment for services rendered a very long time ago.

Is this a rebellious phase? It's the first time she's openly shown that much spine before me. It was about time. She thinks I haven't noticed her actual feelings, but how could she hide her loathing from me, her mentor? I probably know Rei better than her own siblings — probably knew her better even before the coma, for that matter, he thought, staring into her eyes and seeing the steely resolve within.

"What did you say?" He asked, voice effortlessly neutral.

"I want to talk to my siblings. Now."

Such an inopportune moment to show your fangs, pup...

What to do. What to do.

The web of intrigue and betrayal he'd spent such a long time unraveling was almost complete. It led to a place he ought to have suspected due to past and recent events but hadn't since it was so out of the norm. The Pistons were at the epicenter of this whole debacle, but he was almost certain that they were just the middleman, doing the bidding of someone else.

A corp? A wealthy patron?

A wealthy patron may seem far-fetched, but many rich people enjoy the more... gruesome fights they put on display to their inner circle. No, fights may be giving it a false representation. Executions are more apt.

Just like we do, The Pistons have their connections with the higher echelons.

Stalwart Inc. doesn't fit, as its business models are too different from Memtech's. I don't know any other corporation with such a heavy affiliation with The Pistons, though.

What is their goal? A corp other than Stalwart with a grudge against Memtech who wants to take them down a peg by removing one of their limbs, meaning us. Or do we have something a corp or patron wants but can't get to without causing sufficient chaos?

His mind immediately went to Rei as he still hadn't taken his eyes off her.

Unlikely. Her incident doesn't fit into the puzzle in a neat way. Unless...

He continued extrapolating the data using his mental augments and off-loading some of the analysis to his AI as he finally decided to answer. He'd waited long enough to see Rei's confidence wane by the smallest of margins.

"Fine. I'll set up a secure connection for you to communicate through. Take this as a boon for your hard work and dedication."

A brilliant smile that WolfMosh saw to be entirely genuine lit up her face, and she bowed slightly in gratitude.

"Thank you, master."

I sincerely hope this isn't a mistake. I can only be so cruel, though, at least to her.

The fact that even he had limits to his cruelty toward one young woman would have shocked everyone who'd seen his rise to dominating a majority of the criminal underworld of a whole zone.

***

"Rei!" Ichiro shouted in joy.

"Oh, Imouto, I'm so glad to hear from you," Miyo said, wiping her eyes in a futile effort as the tears just kept coming.

Rei felt her own cheeks growing damp as she smiled back at them in their three-way video call.

They're all right. Thank the mesh.

"I've missed you. And I'm sorry it took so long."

"I don't doubt that you tried, Rei-chan. I don't doubt it at all," Ichiro said, his voice growing darker as he started to scowl, "I know perfectly well who's-"

"Anyway!" Miyo interrupted their elder brother, accurately guessing who he'd nearly begun to rant at during a no doubt monitored connection — secure or not. "You look great, Rei! I'm so happy to see that."

Rei felt herself blush slightly, but her smile broadened. "Yeah, I've been keeping up with my exercises and eaten a lot."

"I can see that," Miyo said with a teasing smirk, her eyes flicking downwards.

Ichiro cleared his throat, taking it as his turn to interrupt. He knew perfectly well what kind of conversations a brother shouldn't be part of. "Yeah, well, I'm also happy you're looking better. So, can you tell us what you've been up to these many months?"

Rei opened her mouth to begin gushing about all her time in the mesh when a message popped up, interposing itself on her vision. "Keep it short and concise. For security reasons, they never knew much about your work before the coma, so telling them more than they need to know now isn't helpful."

Rei scowled as the message vanished as swiftly as it had come.

"What is it?" Miyo and Ichiro asked in unison.

"Gag order. Or a partial one, at least. Master says you didn't know much of what I did to begin with, and he sees no reason to change that."

"That's bullshit!" Ichiro cried indignantly.

Miyo shushed him and spoke to Rei, "Very well. We'll just have to be satisfied with what you can tell us. So, go on. What have you been up to?"

Rei spoke in an abbreviated manner about her first days at the facility, getting cyberware installed, and some of her explorations of the various rooms and the people there with her.

Both of her siblings were in agreement with Rei regarding Franklin. He was way too creepy.

Then she went on to briefly go over her exploits in the mesh, mentioning the puzzle cube a fair few times and even ranting a bit at the lack of reward awaiting those who finished it.

Miyo and Ichiro laughed at that, understanding her frustration even if they couldn't comprehend the timescales she left out or the insane amount of work it took to accomplish it.

She then spoke of her training regime, touching upon how her body felt better than ever and how good the food was.

Rei didn't think she would be permitted to speak of any of the jobs she'd received recently and hence merely said that she'd done some tasks while continuing her studying of the mesh and doing puzzles.

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"You've had quite the packed schedule this past year, haven't you? Oh, Imouto, I'm proud of you for keeping that grind going and not simply giving up. It all sounds tough to me," Miyo said emotionally.

Ichiro nodded, adding, "Yeah. Seriously impressive. I'm happy to hear that there hasn't been any funny business with you confined there and all. You know, him taking advan-"

Miyo hissed at Ichiro, sounding remarkably like Sally. "Think before you speak, dumbass."

Ichiro's face made an 'O' before he scowled. "I hate this connection being monitored."

Rei giggled. "You're such a rustskull sometimes."

Ichiro smiled in response, seemingly happy with being jokingly insulted by his youngest sibling.

"So, what have you two been up to?" Rei asked.

They'd been up to a lot, by the sound of it. Well, Ichiro had. Miyo mostly spoke about various boys she'd hooked up with while working at The Drunken Daemons.

Rei learned that Ichiro had been involved in the conflict between the Cyber Fangs and The Pistons, which had recently escalated into a full-blown gang war.

Subordinate gangs on both sides had been massacred — Ichiro himself taking part in one such raid — and many skirmishes between the two major gangs had happened during those times.

Rei felt some anxiety start bubbling up as Ichiro spoke of grueling fights where things had become grim.

I knew this rustskull of a brother would get himself inserted in the middle of it all. Fucking hell.

"Onii-san," Rei interrupted, using the Japanese terminology for the first time to address him. It made him shut his mouth with a click as his eyes focused on her with laser-like intensity.

"I'm not going to tell you to stop, as I know you won't. I don't fault you for it, but can you please promise me to be more careful? Please?" Her tone was almost begging at the end as she held back tears of stress.

Ichiro could only nod dumbly, his own eyes growing a tiny bit misty.

"Say it, Onii-san."

"Alright," He croaked," I promise I'll be more careful."

"See?!" Miyo said happily, breaking the emotional moment between the oldest and youngest siblings. "I told you to be more careful, and I even said Rei would want to do the same. Only a squeak like you would make your loving sisters worry this much."

Ichiro had a chagrined expression but didn't refute it.

"I said alright. Geez."

Miyo humphed before returning her attention to Rei. "So when are you coming to visit us? Talking like this is good and all, but I want to snuggle with my Imouto and watch your favorite shows."

Rei rolled her eyes. "I think you mean your favorite shows. Whatever. Well, to answer honestly? I have absolutely no idea. For some reason, master seems determined to keep me confined here. He doesn't even let me leave my private submesh or freely explore the local one. It's as if he thinks I'm allergic to freedom."

At their blank expressions, she could only sigh.

Is this the future's equivalent to teaching your grandma thrice a year how to use her smartphone?

She dumbed it down for them: "I've not been allowed to leave the facility or my house in the mesh where I work."

"I figured you hadn't left as we would have surely heard from you otherwise," Ichiro mumbled, matte-black chrome fingers glowing with inner crimson radiance moving to rub at his carefully curated beard that had a patch missing from what he'd claimed was a flamethrower.

Miyo pouted but nodded, looking extremely cute as she did so. Rei had no problem seeing her turn that pout into something suggestive to ensnare all those men she kept talking about as if they were trophies won in a competitive sport.

Well, dating kind of is a competitive sport from a certain point of view. I mean, there are even reality shows that cover the whole subject.

Rei knew those kinds of shows existed even back in the early twenty-first century, but the twenty-third century's equivalent was way too graphic for Rei's tastes. Miyo liked them, though, and she'd been forced to watch some of them, feeling a tiny bit awkward as they sat on the sofa together and talked about Miyo's work or anything else inane.

The three siblings continued to talk and laugh with each other, each one delighted at finally having an opportunity to share their thoughts and vent. It was cathartic for everyone, and Rei felt glad she'd pushed so hard for WolfMosh to agree to her demand.

Reading between the lines in the conversations, it had become evident to Rei that both her siblings had begun a series of ever more risky actions in her absence. Their sheer joy and now lack of tension in their postures made it clear that Rei's sudden absence had been the catalyst for these behavioral changes.

She couldn't tell the two adults what to do, but feeling like an impetus for future disasters wasn't something Rei would stand for. Now that they had a secure channel to speak through, she would make sure to use it.

She may not be there to help them in person, but lending an ear and some sympathetic words could go a long way on its own.

「Notice:

Ego attribute has increased.

Ego: 7 → 8

Received: 500 Experience」

***

SmolVoid v1.15 — also known as 'Trashcan't' — looked at Rei curiously, head tilted as Rei tried her best to explain why the now gone data was still relevant.

The program — which took the form of a tiny black cat practically identical to Sally — was still early in its learning phase. It continued to look on without evidently understanding why it had done anything wrong.

Rei sighed, wondering if making the automatic data disposal system in the shape of Sally was what caused the issues. The program's deep-learning algorithms should have progressed enough to know what data it should or shouldn't dispose of.

She often created duplicates of data to tinker with and modify before discarding them, leaving digital litter all around her submesh. This became an issue when WolfMosh infiltrated her submesh with growing ease, even when she increased her security.

It took him casually mentioning that junk data created vulnerabilities he was all too happy to exploit before she realized how stupid she'd been.

Having data that was not strictly part of her submesh's security was fine as long as one took the necessary precautions, but Rei didn't want to spend too much time reworking her security for something so stupid.

Rei was way too lazy to clean up after her every experiment or job. She had better things to do. Hence, she initiated a new project:

The SmolVoid trashcan.

Or Trashcan't, as the cat was now better known as.

No matter how many times Rei ran clear examples of junk data through its algorithms to train it to recognize targets, it always ate something she eventually had a use for. It never happened immediately and could take a few days, but the program always did something stupid in the end.

Sally hasn't learned to astral project into the mesh, right?

Rei sighed. She'd have to revisit the program's coding later, fine-comb it with [Data Analytics], and see what she'd missed. In the meantime, the easiest solution was to throw all the junk data in one area and limit the program's actions to that place.

It was a dirty way to solve it, and Rei liked her work neat and tidy.

"Catch!" Rei shouted, throwing what appeared to be a crumpled piece of parchment into the corner of her workroom.

Trashcan't looked between its maker and the junk data, unimpressed, before strutting over and transforming into a formless void that gobbled up the undesirables with the sound of a vacuum cleaner.

It then snapped back into cat form with a comical pop, sitting itself down in its new corner while licking a paw and utterly ignoring Rei.

Rei gave it the same courtesy.

It had been a week and a half since she'd first spoken with Ichiro and Miyo through the secure channel, and they'd talked two more times during that time. WolfMosh's AI was monitoring the connection, but she still got to learn how quickly things were going sideways in the outside world.

Many assets and locales beneath the umbrella of the Cyber Fangs and The Pistons had been through the wringer, and the dissatisfaction among the general population of Zone 8 was growing by the day.

These businesses and individuals were calling in operators from other zones to protect them, as the usual protection they held by being under the banner of the two most prominent gangs was no longer as effective. People and minor gangs looking to make a quick score by robbing a cyberware store or the like had a much better chance now that the two largest gangs were stretched thin.

All these chaotic elements made large parts of Zone 8 practical warzones, and many speculated that it wouldn't be long before a corporation got involved in settling things down. Chaos on that scale wasn't conducive to doing business, after all.

Rei suddenly looked at the tiny monitor on her desk that beeped before flashing green, meaning that WolfMosh had called for her to exit the mesh for some reason.

He'd stopped dropping by to let her exit the mesh every time a few months ago, instead just sending a signal. Rei didn't know if he'd actually stop her from leaving whenever she felt like it, but spending most of her time in the mesh wasn't something she was against anyhow, so she hadn't tried to push her luck other than that one time.

Giving Trashcan't a look filled with data that heavily implied that it should stay put and not wander around gobbling up whatever data it found — also known as a glare — she disconnected, opening her eyes to the real world.

Removing herself from the DC by releasing her data jack, the gasmask, and the tube circulating coolant through her MDS, she jumped out of the coffin. Two of her fellows were doing the same next to her.

Selvix wasn't present yet, but WolfMosh sat in the corner, beckoning them over.

"Good, you're here. Only Selvix left, ah, there he is." WolfMosh said, turning to look at the dive room's entryway.

Selvix yawned as he walked in a few seconds later, ambling over to take a seat. He looked to have just risen from bed.

"What is it, boss?" Mikaela asked in her raspy voice. "It's unusual for you to have a meeting like this outside the local mesh."

WolfMosh looked pointedly at Rei, and Mikaela sniffed and nodded curtly in understanding.

I still don't understand why I'm not permitted to enter the local mesh after all this time.

"The reason why I called you all here is because I need to leave."

"The war?" Selvix asked.

WolfMosh nodded. "Yes. We don't know who they are, but The Pistons have a Meshmagi on their side who's wreaking havoc on our men in the larger battles. Our less able Magi can't stand up to them."

"Why not send one of us?" Wilma asked.

Both Selvix and Mikaela nodded in agreement.

"Because I need you here. We still don't know how strong they are, and one of you being defeated and captured could endanger the whole gang with the knowledge you hold."

"Why not take one of us with you then?" Rei couldn't help but ask.

WolfMosh and her fellow apprentices all looked at her.

"Not that I'd expect that to be me," she clarified, rolling her eyes.

Mikaela snorted, and Wilma shot her a sympathetic glance. Selvix just frowned at her.

"With all the work I've been doing," WolfMosh said, "I'll need all of you to cover my workload as well. You all know it's no exaggeration to say that I'm doing more than half of the work here, with you four combined doing the remaining part. The Magi above do the more menial tasks, which isn't worth mentioning. With me gone, you'll need to pick up the slack so our organization doesn't collapse from within. We need the credits now more than ever."

All of them nodded in understanding, even Rei.

"So, Rei. I'll be giving you access to our local secure mesh during this time, and if you behave yourself, that access may stay after I've come back. Is that clear?"

Rei could only stare for a few seconds, meeting his cold crimson eyes with her orange ones.

"Is that wise?" Selvix asked hesitantly.

"Oh, shut up, Selvix. Even if you or Miss 'Broken Heart' over there doesn't trust Rei, it isn't our call. And how much damage do you even think she'll be able to do?"

Mikaela flinched at the frankly insidious nickname, and Rei looked between her and Wilma in confusion. She'd always thought they got along well enough.

Not needing the conversation to spiral, WolfMosh cleared his throat and glared at Rei.

"Yes, master." She answered promptly.

"Good. You three show her around the local mesh to get her up to speed. Then, settle in for a heavy workload."

As WolfMosh stood, heavy clunks were heard from the corridors outside, and then multiple sets of steps from something metallic and heavy sounded.

"Security bots," Wilma said in answer to Rei's questioning glance.

"Get to it," WolfMosh commanded, not giving Rei a chance to go see the security bots for herself.

Damn. I suppose I'll get a chance to see some of it later as they are probably there for our protection during the whole of the boss's absence.

Rei followed the others as they entered their respective dive chambers.