Rent was today, which was just… awesome. There goes sixteen hundred Rayn, leaving me with just four hundred. I need to get another job soon…

But until then, my stash so I could finally get on with some other plans! And it would be free if I had any luck. I’ve been thinking about this for a very, very long time; where should I set up? Everywhere had their dangers, but the number one thing I was afraid of was someone else finding it. It needed to be in a secluded location, have good security, and be hard to track down. Bonus points for being hard to track me back to.

After hours of deliberation, and a rather helpful look at a map, where better to put it than the Underground? It was very secluded, only the occasional merc squad headed down there for one reason or another. Oh, and cultists I guess. Rarely did anyone head down there, which helped security. It was rife with monsters, so it had good natural security. And I could easily lose tails in the Underground, so it would be hard to follow me back. Oh, and I could enter the Underground from almost anywhere in the city, so it would be easy to just disappear after a heist.

The more I thought about this, the more I liked it. Especially after I memorized that map marked with the thousands of structures, tunnels, and caves. My mind was also rife with hundreds of entryways, so I could literally enter from wherever.

I took a while, sitting back and thinking through the map in all its detail. My mental focus was largely on the Little Yukoto area, though I did keep my mind open about other districts. Or at least, most other districts. East End with their supposed parasites and Portside with its fungal growths were out… though they would provide additional security. Hmm…

The Corporate Quarter was also largely out. I could head into it and set up a base there, but there was no telling what the corpos have set up in their slice of the Underground. Mystech also had an underground complex, possibly even reaching the Underground in depth. Well, probably reaching the Underground. Corpos love their over-the-topness.

So really, I was just keeping my mind out for Little Yukoto, Oldtown, the fringes of Downtown, and Bricktown… wow, there really were a lot of ‘towns’ in Aythryn City. How come I never noticed that before? I'm surprised Portside wasn’t called Port Town.

Out of everywhere though, Little Yukoto was my preferred district. Not only since it was close to home, this a shorter walk than, say, Oldtown, but I was also more familiar with the area. That, and I’d ripped Little Yukoto off the map that the Blue Crusade had.

As I went through the sections of the map for viable places, I wrote down their approximate locations. Then I went back through the list, narrowing down my options to the three best, though I kept the rest in mind. It was important to get to the right place, so I didn’t want to just settle for something suboptimal.

I prepped my gear, gathering supplies, materials, toys, and various tools for an extended trip into the Underground. With any luck, I’d avoid combat entirely, but I could never be too sure. I loaded up with my SB-17 AR and my old faithful Rhymer. I even packed my newest pistol, Saber-19, and its silver rounds just in case.

Of course, I brought explosives too. I made three Molotovs, packed the last flashbang from Hope, a fair length of det-cord, and a couple of frag grenades just in case.

As for my armor, I didn’t immediately put it on. I didn’t want the thing to track back to me, and just a single camera spotting it leaving my apartment could potentially do so. Instead, I tossed it into my bag. I’d throw it on when I actually got to the Underground or an entrance into the Underground.

My bag weighed a ton as I headed down to my bike, and I couldn’t help but feel I overpacked a bit. That thought vanished when I remembered all the different ghouls, mutants, and monstrosities dwelling in the deep. This trip would also be my first solo trip down there in a long time, so I’d rather not get caught out. There was a high chance the places I wanted to check out were already inhabited too.

My first stop before doing anything though? Big Mike’s for a nice, juicy burger to ease my nerves. Then I was off for the Sabyt sub-district, the one Absolom Clinic sat in. If the map was correct, there was a small entrance over there that would do nicely.

I mentally overlayed the city map of Little Yukoto over the ancient map of the Underground, comparing landmarks and distances till I narrowed down where exactly the entrance I wanted sat.

I narrowed it down to an apartment’s basement, one that was rather difficult to reach. I parked my bike in a nearby parking garage and walked around the block I thought it was in as I rechecked my path. Traffic in this part of the city was low, the Intercity above drawing most of it away. The Intercity highway’s pillars cut into old architecture and the sidewalks, making plenty of narrow gaps and corners.

Thankfully though, no one seemed to really care about this area. The only people I saw were those coming or going. Part of that had to do with the lack of businesses in the area. These buildings were ancient, built back when residential buildings were just single-purpose without bodegas and stores built into them.

I eyed my target. It was a jagged structure, the bricks were closer to spikes and sharp points more than anything thanks to the decades, hell maybe even a century, that it sat here. It blended in, all of its features shared amongst the couple of blocks along this road.

Massive billboards and holograms covered almost every surface of the building, advertising various wares and illicit services. Most of them were glitchy, the graphics jumping around and pixelating due to years since their last repairs. Tattered radar dishes sat at almost every junction, each pointed in different directions as crackling wires hung loosely all over the building. A mess of oxidized copper pipework scaled up the sides of the brick apartment building.

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I headed to the place's entryway and was stopped at the front door by a rather new-looking code lock. An ancient camera sat up in the corner of the entry, staring down at me with a beeping red light. Wasn’t expecting that. No way I could hack into this...

Putting on an act, I threw on my best innocent expression, leaning forward to hit the code lock. I tried one two three four five, to no avail. The code lock rang, and a yellow warning light flashed up at me. I put on a confused expression and leaned back at the building’s street marker. I shifted my expression to understanding as I walked back out of the camera’s view.

It was all a bit unnecessary, at least as long as nobody was actively watching the cameras for the place. If there was active security though, I didn’t want to alert them that I might be doing something nefarious.

I looked around the place, mentally checking my city map as I tried to look for a workaround. Unfortunately, the apartment building was sandwiched tightly between two buildings, so there wasn’t even an alley I could try to take advantage of.

That left me with a couple options. The first was the easiest, find a different location. Seeing as I liked the area this was in, its incredibly low traffic was ideal for discretion, I leaned towards my other options. The way I saw it, I could go out and hire a Netrunner to get the code for me, but that would be a bit of a waste. Or I could attempt entry through… alternative measures.

The roof was probably open, so that was an option… how to get up there though? I wandered around to the apartments next door, though this time I spotted the security beforehand. I checked the other just to be sure, but all three were locked down with electronic security.

I shifted my attention to the alleyways. Both of them were absolutely filthy, and the one to the right of my mark was inaccessible due to a collapsed fire escape. The other alley, in a similar state of trash buildup and filth, got around the whole fire escape collapsing due to age by simply not having one. There were marks in the brick as if there had been one at some point, but it had long been replaced by pipe and wire work.

I eyed the pipes. They were varied and dominant enough that I might be able to climb up them if I was careful. Yeah, if I squinted real hard, I could almost pretend they were a rock wall and not a poorly connected mess of thick copper pipes. I cast my gaze around the alley, checking for any security I might’ve missed on my initial sweep. Nothing.

First things first, gloves. There was no way I could get up this thing and not cut myself, so I went ahead and pulled on a set of gloves. I shifted the weight around in my backpack, getting more comfortable with the way it moved around.

Then I was off. I climbed up onto a pile of garbage that at one point might’ve been a dumpster, using it as a springboard to latch onto a pipe hanging down over the alley. I hastily pulled myself up onto it. From there, it ran horizontally, so I pulled myself up onto it, walking along its length. The entire thing groaned underneath, though I tried to keep my mind off of falling as I jumped up and latched onto an AC unit. It was just wide enough to get a good grip on.

From there, I shimmed along the edge of the unit, swinging to latch onto a bracket for the pipe. The metal gave a bit under my weight but held strong. I climbed a series of brackets as though they were a ladder, pulling myself up a fair distance. Then it was a simple process of repetition, going through the motions as I climbed from one pipe to another, with the occasional AC unit thrown in there.

Sweat dripped down my head, some of it caught by my Slasher's hat, as I pulled myself up and over the final pipe. The edge of the roof was within reach, so I crouched down into a spring and jumped up for it. One of my hands pulled a loose brick off the wall, the other bearing my full weight for several terrifying moments. Then I latched the other onto the bricks and hauled myself over the edge.

I tumbled onto the brick, my bag squishing me with its weight as all the air left my lungs. A groan escaped my lips as I rolled over, trying to get my breath back under control.

The roof of the building connected directly to the one I wanted into, so once I felt calmed down enough, I simply walked over and hopped the retainer wall. Cigarette butts covered the roof, a thin layer of ash over most of it. The building reached quite tall, the Intercity maybe a story or two above. The constant rumbles of traffic over it were oddly soothing.

I tried the door- unlocked. I swept the dust off, getting my act together as if I were just another resident, and then entered the building. The door was a typical fire escape, the red strips over it warning of a fire alarm that would never go off. I pulled the map of the building up as I walked, locking down onto places of interest throughout the place. Most of the rooms were just normal ole apartments, though the security room was on the highest floor alongside the offices.

I headed for the security room first, carefully keeping my head down and cap covering me as I passed through security. The Advent Ghost had a built-in feature scrubber, so my face should just show as a blur on all cameras, but it never hurt to be safe.

A camera looked down at the security door, though no other camera watched the area. It was simple to walk on by, then loop back to the camera and unplug a wire from the ancient tech.

Then I picked the lock on the door and carefully entered. A bank of monitors and servers covered one wall. The other had a small cot, a guard sleeping peacefully on it. He was snuggled tight to the cot, a blanket wrapped around him and a teddy bear clutched tightly in his hands.

My steps were dead silent as I entered the room and headed for the monitors, carefully pulling them out of sleep mode as quietly as I could. It booted up to a login screen for ‘Realm of Retribution’, some kind of RPG game. Last log on? A couple hours ago after a full night of playing. Wasn’t hard to put two and two together.

It took a bit to figure out how they had their files set up, but eventually, I found their security feeds. I did the same thing as when I infiltrated the Neo-Jokers. I took the parts where I appeared on the cameras and overlaid them with looped footage, entirely erasing my electronic presence. My facial scrubber took care of any instant recognition, but I could still be recognized off my gear and body shape.

Once I erased my traces, I looked through the rest of the system. It seemed as though they used a rather sophisticated facial recognition software, something completely out of place with the ancient rest of the tech. I added my particular pattern of facial scrubbing to the software so it wouldn’t raise any red flags. I also put in a residential password so I could get in through the door if there was a next time. I was now Bertha Magnus, a maid who comes and goes occasionally to clean the basement.

After that, I loaded back up the game screen and left the guard to his rest, slipped out of the room, reconnected the camera, and headed down towards the basement.