Trashsite's giant bunker housed 4 giant warehouses in an enclosed climate-controlled space. The two northern ones - warehouse 1 and 2 - stored most of the smaller items, while the southern 3 and 4 were basically one giant long-house that had anything from cannons to Titans.

The truck was parked in one of the unused loading bay next to warehouse 3, engines shut to give off the impression that it was empty.

As she watched Miu's fingers clack away at her keyboard, Luce fantasised of heist movies where the hacker's computer run lines of glowing words that scrolled down the reflection of their glasses. But Miu did not need glasses, nor was there an entire widow of digital green text constantly climbing up. There was just a basic software no more special than a text editor. Occasionally, Miu would type a line in and wait. After a couple of seconds, a few words would be printed out, she would read them, and repeat the process all over again.

"This is..." Luce began.

"A lot more boring than you thought?" Shou finished. "Yeah, that's what I said."

"Well," Miu bit back. "I'm sorry if hacking isn't more glamorous."

A loading bar popped up and quickly filled. After a second of lag, the familiar beige interface of the military's internal operating system came onto the screen.

"I'm in," Miu said. "Searching for bio-cell model 'Regalia'. It's... in warehouse one, row three, aisle nine. Which is convenient, because that's where Marble is."

"That's for me then," Shou chimed in. "And the GASP?"

"Hang on..." she replied, typing away again. "It needs top-secret clearance so... giving myself clearance... it's in warehouse three, but the system doesn't say exactly where."

Luce raised a brow. "Why not?"

"It's high security. Probably the people who need to know already know where it is kind of deal." She paused for a moment to think. "It needs to activate concurrently with the E.M.P. So it should be in the Faraday area."

"Got it." Luce slung her rifle and stood up. "I know where that is."

Miu took out two grenades from a box next to her and handed them to Luce. "They are for your launcher. One E.M.P and one stun. Those are all we have, so make sure they count." She then handed her a small earpiece. "I'll run interference from the truck and keep us in comm range. I've also updated your cards with clearance. The server checks for intrusion once every half an hour and takes and a half to scan. So you have about forty minutes to do this."

Luce nodded and kept the grenade in the pocket of her army pants while setting the earpiece in her right ear to be hidden under her hair. She then got out of the truck and onto the loading bay. Without turning back, she walked to the nearest door as the sound of Miu and Shou driving off for Warehouse 1 echoed behind her.

When she was a Titan Hunter for the army, she often had to come to Trashsite to withdraw older - arguably more reliable - weapons. One of those was the Whisper Rifle, the predecessor to the G.A.S.P. It was a medium-ranged gun specifically designed to destroy a small area of magic circuit that was hit. It got the name due to its magically imbued projectile making little to no sound. It was succeeded by the Augment APC Cannon attachment. Both weapons, while reliable, were highly susceptible to electromagnetic pulses and were thus stored in the Faraday area when not in used.

She followed the familiar winding hallways throughout the building. The clay-tiled floors were still the same drab as the white plaster ceiling and walls. The entire facility still used heavy set steel doors with the old model of card readers - a basic chip and scanner. Nothing much had changed except for a new vending machine next to the office area.

Then, she reached her first obstacle. The first door which required a clearance level. There was a guard standing at the door who barely looked at her. Instead, his gaze drifted off, bored out of his mind in the distance. She made a mental effort to tell herself to remain calm. Though she had her doubt, she had to scan her card without hesitation. Whether it worked or not was a question for later. As she reached for the card in her pocket, she made sure to keep her hands off her rifle. While weapons were allowed, being too close to the trigger would be suspicious, especially since everyone there was supposed to be on the same side.

Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.

The guard barely glanced at her as she scanned her card. A moment passed, the ageing tech taking longer than she remembered. Then, a beep and a green light followed the click of an unlocked door. Quickly, she followed through and let out a breath she did not know she was holding. All seemed good and clear.

She continued through the warehouse, occasionally scanning her card at readers next to doors for further access. Each time she did so, she expected her clearance to be denied and the wailing of sirens to follow. Each time she was cleared, she sighed.

"This is Shou. I've retrieved Marble. Heading over to the storage now. But bad news. I saw Corlyle coming in. He's here, over." Shou's voice crackled through the earpiece.

When she was sure no one else was watching, Luce pressed the button on the side. "He must be here to activate the GASP. I'm almost there. Over."

Miu's voice echoed, "Shou, get the bio-cell as quickly as you can and meet me at loading bay five. Luce, double-time, over and out."

She followed the order, practically jogging through the corridors. Finally, she reached the Faraday area. To prepare, she loaded the stun grenade into her launcher. With one final swipe of her card, she entered the room. The outer walls and ceilings of the area were meshed with silver wires to create a protective case against electromagnetic pulses. Inside, a single desk with a soldier sat opposite the small entry room. A path to the right of it lead to the lockers, where the smaller equipment were stored. The left extended to the storage space for larger equipment.

Luce had expected a larger security detail than a single clerk for a room containing a superweapon.

She approached the military man. "Hey, I'm here to withdraw an Augment." She looked at his name tag. "Private Ryan."

"The man looked up quizzically. "Sure. Do you have the forms?"

"Forms?" she asked.

He sighed exaggeratedly. "Look, the memo went out days ago. New rule. Get form seventeen dash four-five signed by a commanding officer of level four clearance, then we talk."

She pretended to scratch the side of her head as she hit the switch to her communication set. "I don't have the forms. Can't you just let me have this? I don't want to get chopped by my C.O. I mean, it's just us two here."

The guard sighed empathetically. "Look, I know how you feel but..."

His word trailed off as Shou's voice boomed into her ear. "He knows! This is Corlyle's M.O. Hide something by not drawing attention to it. The guard's quality over quantity. He knows!"

The guard began to finish, "I've got a form here you can sign to expedite things..." He reached for the desk drawer

She grabbed the handle of her rifle and swung the butt just as Private Ryan pulled out a pistol from beneath and attempted to aim at her. The wooden stock slapped the sidearm away to the ground before he got her in his sight. The man then switch tactic, kicking off the wall behind him to lunge over the desk at her.

To escape, she attempted to sidestep but her ankle was caught by the soldier and she tripped over, rolling over her shoulder and back up onto her knees. Luce twisted around to see him drawing a knife, preparing to lunge. She pulled the second trigger on her gun and the launcher fired the stun grenade. While the grenade did not arm itself over the short room distance, it did still stun, surprising Private Ryan enough to prevent him from dodging as the projectile smashed into his sternum.

Though knocked back, in visible pain, and unable to make a sound from the air being cracked out of his chest, the man surprisingly managed to stay on his feet. But Luce quickly rushed him, and after a final rifle butt to the face, the man was thrown back and onto the grown, unconscious and with a bleeding - and presumably broken - nose.

"Guys," she quickly reported. "Had a fight. Things are going to get dicey. Evac ASAP, over."

"Roger that," Miu answered. "I picked up Shou. We're heading over now. Meet at the same bay, over and out."

Luce ran over to the computer and without any hesitation, unlocked every single door in the storage area. She ran down the corridor. Behind each of the doors that had automatically rolled up were either large mystery boxes or room-sized machines that ranged from cannons to mysterious doohickeys. She did not know what the G.A.S.P looked like, but she had a feeling she would know when she saw it. And towards the end, she did.

In room 39 was a single large machinery in the middle that looked like the cross between a giant magnetic coil with a plasma globe above. Within the globe, a magic crystal a meter wide and tall was suspended by struts of titanium. Large wires ran to the wall of the rooms where computers hung against the wall. Three power cable coiled to the size of a wheel ran out to the wall at the back, presumably directly to the power grid.

She loaded the E.M.P grenade into her launcher and manually set the timer for 20 seconds. She stood as far into the empty room opposite to give the projectile the distance to arm itself. Once with her back against the wall, she fired. The tube projectile bounced off the power coupling and landed in the corner of the G.A.S.P room. She quickly ran out and pulled the door down and shut.

"Freeze!"

Luce froze. Slowly, she turned to her life to see the barrels of two rifles trained to her head. Behind the two soldiers, standing with freshly jelled hair and in a brazenly ironed black suit was Corlyle.

She heard the E.M.P grenade blast through the door.

Everything went black.