An orange hue similar to morning’s light traversed the night sky. Below that orange hue, were tufts of smoke flocking to the night sky like a pack of birds scattering across Bridge City, looking for a new nesting ground. It was beautiful, no doubt, but it was not dawn so that meant one thing.

Bridge City was on fire.

The fire came from the west side of Bridge City, where Welkey’s Industrial District was located. It seemed the riots within the district had reached new heights. One that left an entire district on fire?

I could see it clear as day as I stood on the helicopter landing port where the Xenotis was parked. I absorbed every smidgen of cold watching the warmth transfix to the sky.

Incoming Call…

“So much for that,” I said. “Cypher…” I answered.

“Where are you, Cypher?” The commissioner asked gruffly.

“Standing on the roof of Lyiez Systems…watching the city burn,” I answered, bitterly.

“Humph…morbid aren't you?

“A bit…”

“Anyways…I read the reports you’ve sent, did you find anything at Lyiez Systems?”

“Yes, a whole lot…Stepson Vizare is dead.”

“WHAT?”

“Suicide…came and found him dead. From the looks of it, he blew his brains out with a revolver.”

“That’s…” The commissioner whispered.

“bullshit?” I asked.

“Did you find out anything?” Hexan asked, ignoring me.

“I did the paperwork that tied into everything. I don’t think I've drawn a perfect picture, but I can send you what I have.”

“Do it.”

“Aye…”

I slapped the datacube that I got from the Federation’s assassin, and slot into within my Cybernetic arm. A loading bar resonated into my Cybernetic Eye starting from 0% and going to 100%.

I logged into the BLED database, pulling up the merged case files of both Adrianna and the John Doe and, I watched as the datacube loaded itself into the case file like a virus.

If they don’t know Mr Black, then how in the Imbibe did he know about what was going on? I thought, asking myself. He knew what was going down. He even warned me to make the smart choice, but not the right choice.

Only a man with power could know such things, and I don’t mean the power of credits. Real Power. The power within Antillea Federation itself. What have you found yourself in, Cypher? I asked myself bitterly.

“That’s everything, Commissioner,” I said, after sending the Case file over.

As I stood there, watching the smoke trail up the night sky, leaving the city smogged with ash. Luckily, I could neither smell the ash nor feel the heat from so far away.

Thousands of thoughts rushed through my mind, as I’d read the report a few times. The Commissioner was smart. How would I manoeuvre through the questions the commissioner had for me? Am I smart enough to pull this off?

“So let me get this straight, Cypher…from Data Protection to Poultry startup? That’s a stark shift in a business transition, Dontcha think?”

“It is. Seems as if the board had a schism and multiple factions grew because of that.”

“No. The factions didn’t start because of that. They’re always factions within any organisation. In a case like this, especially when credits involved…well, let's just say assassination and murder are what to expect.”

“I take it you have your own faction within the force?” I asked.

“That. is no concern of yours,” Commissioner Hexan said gruffly.

That was a ‘yes’, but I couldn’t care less. I just wanted this over with.

Evil Corporation making DNA swapped Clones.

Low-Level Gang chasing me throughout the City.

My day was ass, and I wanted to rest.

“Have you heard anything from the board of directors?” the commissioner asked.

“I haven’t,” I said.

“I see. Alright, this will have to do for now. I’ll have Eclain follow up with them…If we have trouble locating them, I’ll give you a call, understood?”

“Yes, Commissioner Hex--.”

The line went dead before I could even finish.

I got into the Xenotis and ensured the car was on autopilot. “Circle the City, Nova, I need rest,” I told the AA.

“Acknowledged, Sir,” Nova answered.

My body seeped into the chair as the cool wind from the AC vent blew across my skin, making goosebumps rise in waves across my body.

I felt at peace for the first time in days.

The Xenotis ascended and descended through the multiple skylanes that traversed Bridge City. I had no plotted course, so I let Nova navigate the car through the city, hoping to avoid any traffic jams that were associated with the riots.

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As dark as the tint of Xenotis was, I could still feel the neon lights of The City beam through, hitting my eyelids. It was annoying as hell, and as much as I shifted from left to right to avoid, avoiding its beams, it was futile.

“Can’t you avoid this section?”

“Sorry, Sir sir, I can’t., This District is the only one unaffected from the traffic congestion from the riotsRiots inbrought about from the Industrial District.”

I pursed my lips and buried my annoyance. “Fine,” I grumbled.

I rolled to my left once more and felt the datacube that sat, I had nestled into my pocket. I’d been ignoring it through my rest, but this time it felt as though it was calling to me. “….alright,” I finally said, pushing myself up from my slumber. “Let’s see this ‘Goodwill’ Mr Black has for me.”

I fished the datacube from out of my pocket and thumbed the grooves that protruded from it. Sleek, but not as rigid as the one Stepson tossed me before he’d gotten his brains blown out. I slid the datacube into the slot on my dashboard and watched as a loading screen pulsed into existence on my windscreen on the passenger side. The screen was black and had an hourglass circling every two seconds. There was a yellow loading bar below that began to fill slowly. Once it reached 50%, it stalled, then it resets back to 28%.

“What the hell?” I growled, confused.

Incoming Call…

“Cypher…”I answered angrily after the fourth ring.

“Took you long enough…” a strangely familiar voice said gruffly.

“Who is this?” I asked.

“You forgot me already…Cypher? I’m hurt…truly hurt,” The man said, tone laced in sarcasm.

“Mr Black.”

Soft thuds came through the phone, in the form of clapping. The man was sarcastically gruff. It annoyed the living shit out of me. “As you’re here, let’s just get to the point,” He said jovially. “dicit mihi apertum”

Whatever he said, in the dead language he spoke, the loading screenshot up to 89% in a blink of an eye. “I’ll be seeing you around, Cypher…” he said chuckling, and then the line went dead.

A video popped up on the passenger side of the windscreen and I knew instantly where it took place, despite the choppy quality of it.

Old Bridge City.

The shot was taken from an overview shot of Old City. The hundreds, if not thousands of houses and buildings clustered together separated by small roads, snaking through the concrete rubble of the city wasn’t foreign to me in general, but it was to me in the heights.

Below, I could see the Xenotis parked in an alleyway. I watched as I got out of the car and waited for Shedrick, who appeared from the skies in a Hover-Scooter descending from the south of the Old City. “Leth, what’s happening…your feed’s Choppy,” Mr Black said. “looks like he’s ordered some firepower, Sir,” Leth answered in the video.

I couldn’t hear the other voice over the comm. network, but more than likely it was either Mr Black or one of his lieutenants.

The camera rattled from left to right, making me squint as I strained trying to watch, but it only made me flustered.

What was the relevance of this though? I asked myself. Mr Black said that this was ‘Goodwill’, but all this was, was me, about to fight these fools of a gang.

The camera zoomed in on me, whilst I checked the briefcase that Shedrick bought me. Then it zoomed back out, showing the entire alleyway once more.

After a brief conversation, Shedrick hopped onto his Hoover-Scooter, spooled up the engine and took to the skies, making his exit. “Why?” the voice said, “nothing’s out west…following him would be a waste. I might need to back up Vartho.”

“forget Vartho, follow whoever that is, we don’t need any unpleasant sizes. I need him.” Mr Black said.

The camera turned, following Shedrick’s Hoover-Scooter burn trail. “Roger that, following the Hoover-Scooter,” Leth said over the comms. The angle rocked left and right and zipped towards the Hoover-Scooter, following at a distance.

As Leth followed, Old City rushed below him. It was like watching the city faze behind you as you chase your target. And in this case, Shedrick.

My heart skipped a beat each second I watched as Shedrick sped across the dead city. The beats that skipped, were filled with wroth, instead. The urge to call up Shedrick banged across my mind, like a hammer to an anvil. Only two things could’ve happened Shedrick was captured by Mr Black ….or something else.

Two Vehicles lined up next to Shedrick from out of nowhere, slamming into the side, squeezing him between the two. They brought him down to the ground, across a shattered highway.

The view switched angled left, following Shedrick and his assailants, as if they were trying to get a better angle. “Boss…something just crashed into the kid,” Leth said. The audio went dead for three seconds. “If I fire a microspike, I’ll give away my position.”

“DO IT!” Mr Black growled.

A loud oof followed and snapped across a mangled rooftop, close to the vicinity of the two trucks and Hoover-Scooter.

“What the hell was that?” a voice said, echoing through the feedback loop of the camera.

“Doesn’t matter, the city’s dead and so will this bastard be”

“Who are you?” Shedrick asked, voice groaning to a hick.

“Does that matter at this point?”

He didn’t answer.

“You brought something for Cypher…didn’t you?” a cold sharp tone echoed, slicing the air around them.

“Who?” The strangely familiar voice said.

“Don’t play with me, Courier…”

“I don’t know any ‘Siphon’…I was told to drop off a briefcase here.”

“There’s no need to lie. I know that you delivered that weapon to him in Underwent.”

Again no confirmation from Shedrick.

“Don’t be a fool Shedrick…your life matters…just say yes,” I said, feeling anxiety wash over my body.

“I..I..don’t know what you’re talking about”

A loud smack hissed through the microspike, filtering through with static hicks croaking intermittently. Silence echoed for a moment, then I heard a snap, followed by a loud gunshot that echoed through the microspike twice, due to its proximity.

I slammed my hand across my dashboard, shaking the datacube in the slot. It fizzled from the dislodgement for a second but pulsed back into existence. Did that BASTARD kill Shedrick? My fist throbbed with pain.

“Fool!.” a sharp voice said.

I know that voice…

“Gather up, we’re heading back.”

“But boss ever--?”

“You think this Cypher can handle thirteen of us?”

No response came.

That’s the same voice that filtered through my comms in Underwent…Akatani…that’s Akatani. I thought bitterly.

The sound of spooling engines ruffled through the air, as two vehicles began to shake the shingles from the rooftops within Old City. Leth, or whoever his name, had kept himself well hidden from the altercation.

“Inspecting the body now, Sir,”

Leth descended from the sky at an angle that verified he was using a jetpack, probably a modified version with noise dampening vents. He ran down the alley, his body cam shaking as he traversed the rocky road. He hooked a corner and his body lay on the ground with blood pool all around him.

It was Shedrick.

Tears flowed from my eyes, I couldn’t believe it. Shedrick's dead? Over a delivery? What the hell happened? This wasn’t right. Doesn’t the Kourier Alliance protect each Kourier’s information? How did Akatani find out who Shedrick was, I thought, mind going numb each second.

I ruminated on that for thirty minutes, whilst the video was paused, and it finally came to me. He knows someone within the Kourier Alliance, not an official, but a courier himself, but why kill Shed? He didn’t do anything but his job.

No. No. I need to confirm this.

Incoming Call.

“Not now, Rex…” I growled.

Gunshots filtered through from Rex’s end, followed by the Cyberweaver’s heavy breathing, “I need your help, Cypher!”

“For you to charge me for that as well?”

“Come on, Cypher…I’m about to die here.”

“Death comes in twos, Rex…maybe it’s your time,” I said bitterly.

“What? What whoreshit on you on…look man, is it an apology you need? Cause I ain't got one…it’s either you save me now or skud off, you ain't the only asshole I know.”

“…where are you?” I asked after calming myself from Shedrick’s death.

“Industrial District…”

“You’ve got to be shitting me, wait one damn SECOND…are you helping the Rioters?”

“I am not…I’m doing a job for Lekatron Vidds.”

“You’re an idiot.”

“Clearly…now come save me.”

“No.”

“YOU BASTARD!”

The urge to smirk was there, but I didn’t have the energy. I was angry, frustrated and most importantly, sad. Shedrick was dead, and that was because of me. How was I to get this sorted? I didn’t know, but I had no choice. I needed help, and Rex would surely be needed.

“…I’ll do it,” I countered hesitantly, “but I need a favour.”

“Anything, Cypher…just get my ass out of this bullshit.”

“Fine…”

“Wait a minute…what type of favour?”

“I need to verify if a video was stitched or not…”